Motor Oil Group CIO Nick Giannakakis

The former BAT CTO joined the €9.5 billion Greek energy conglomerate at the start off of 2020: the first time the organisation has experienced a team CIO job.

Motor Oil Team CIO Nick Giannakakis thinks the job of the Chief Data Officer is to be the “custodian of digital transformation”.

The former Chief Technological know-how Officer at British American Tobacco, Giannakakis joined the €9.5 billion revenue Greece-centered energy conglomerate at the start off of 2020 sitting on its govt administration crew, the first time the organisation experienced a team CIO job.

Operating in the southeast space of Europe, Motor Oil begun as an oil and gas business and its Corinth refinery is the second-most significant in Europe. It is now an finish-to-finish energy business as a single of the major stores in the region with far more than one,300 ease stores it sells direct to the shopper through brands like Cyclon and Coral Fuel, renamed just after the acquisition in 2010 of all of Shell’s downstream operations in Greece.

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Speaking with NS Media Team, Giannakakis defined that the team – forty seven.4% owned by the prominent Greek Vardinogiannis family through a keeping firm and the rest of its shares detailed on the Athens Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange – also has a media business and direct-to-shopper utility business, even though a tiny financial institution was also recently added to its portfolio.

“Motor Oil is a team with far more than fifty a long time of background,” Giannakakis explained, and that just after a prosperous period of time of expansion and advancement the leadership begun contemplating about its tactic to technologies.

“There was no job as Team CIO, even though everybody on the govt administration recognized technologies as enjoying a extremely significant job in the expansion of the team. There was an assessment from a third get together about the need for a Chief Data Officer centered on the firm aspirations, and the consequence was to establish the CIO job as element of the govt leadership crew.”

Electronic Transformation Custodian

Giannakakis explained his CIO remit as getting the interpreter and defender of the energy conglomerate’s digital ambitions, assisting rework its present operations, focusing on a improved expertise, and embedding digital DNA in a what was a standard oil and gas business started in 1970.

“Everyone understands that the energy market is on the verge of transformation,” he explained. “Therefore the job of the CIO is – almost nothing far more, almost nothing a lot less – the custodian of this digital transformation. As element of the remit of the job the CIO demands to be ready to interpret and defend the digital ambition of Motor Oil Team.”

To rework its present operations and aid generate new business styles, Giannakakis explained it was his job as CIO to introduce some new terminology and methodology.

“You need the CIO to be ready to get the technique, interpret to actionable goods, and introduce for the first periods in our team phrases like agility and style contemplating. And at the finish of the day to be ready to impose on the organisation – this extremely prosperous organisation – a digital DNA,” he explained.

Giannakakis has been in job for 6 months as team CIO at Motor Oil, and explained the blend of Covid-19 and the oil price war which has observed a steep slide in costs as a “double jeopardy” of challenging events dealing with the organisation and the market.

The reaction has been to accelerate digital operating initiatives which has observed a significant maximize in adoption throughout its head office, manufacturing and retail environments – with the Motor Oil Team board chaired by billionaire oil and transport magnate Vardis Vardinogiannis assembly remotely for the first time.

“I believe it’s in our character to be ready to adapt,” Giannakakis explained. “I have observed persons that in the beginning ended up under no circumstances utilised to digital technologies not only be ready to conduct properly, but also to prosper.”

In the retail place, Giannakakis explained that in spite of the disaster Motor Oil did not halt its capital expenditure investments. As an alternative it was forced to prioritise.

For the CIO, this was to target on the consumer expertise and programmes which target on a return on their technologies investments.

“Because we are in ease retail, we have to struggle for the time of the consumer – the time they get there in the petrol station and the minutes they invest there,” Giannakakis explained, including that the introduction of plug-in electric powered motor vehicles will completely rework the standard petrol station.

Renewables and Electronic Twins

“I detest to use that motto that a disaster is not just a problem but also an possibility, but in our circumstance we have observed some extremely attention-grabbing movement,” Giannakakis explained, noting that even though pure gas sales experienced minimized there experienced been a significant maximize in non-fuel retail and its e-commerce system to the extent Motor Oil has commenced a romantic relationship with a few courier companions to take care of the overall quantity of transactions.

“Independent of the Covid situation or the oil price war, our business these days is dealing with a significant transformation curve,” Giannakakis explained. “CO2 reduction and electrical motor vehicles will rework the overall petrol station expertise.

“It will force us to target on personalisation, frictionless expertise, and other possibilities like blockchain or other platforms.”

Giannakakis explained that energy companies desired to observe the innovation curve, and target on investing in renewables even though also hunting at increasing the present manufacturing and oil refinery method.

“We have to observe that curve,” he explained. “We are focusing on what we get in touch with the digital refinery we have our North Star which for us is the digital twin.”

Giannakakis cited Norwegian energy large Equinor and its CIO Åshild Hanna Larsen, recognised as Europe’s main CIO in a 2019 initiative, as market leaders.

“Equinor for us is a single of the North Stars – if you see how they develop their digital twin, it’s astounding,” Giannakakis explained. “I was very joyful to see this kind of movement from a standard organisation.

“At the exact time we are heavily investing in renewables, and we have to see how can we utilize technologies to the renewable market.”

Edge Computing and Prescriptive Analytics

Giannakakis worked at BAT for 7 a long time, Swiss luxury producer and retailer Richemont for a few a long time, and Coca-Cola for 6 a long time.

Now at energy conglomerate Motor Oil he pointed out edge computing and prescriptive analytics as some of the emerging technologies established to have a significant influence on the sector and beyond.

“Being element of an organisation with extremely large manufacturing, I’m starting to be impressed by Edge Computing,” he explained. “I believe Edge Computing is heading to rework large market organisations it’s absolutely a match-changer for all the significant large industries.

“I’m also seeing that prescriptive analytics is a definitely a match-changer. I have observed far more companies take the past move from predictive to prescriptive,” he explained of getting ready to go beyond anticipating what is probable to materialize, to deploying the technologies now suggesting the finest classes of motion to take.

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