Franck studied Energy at the University of Rouen and received an Engineer Degree and then followed a Master of Mechanical Engineering at Cranfield University in United Kingdom. Later on, he earned an Executive Degree from the London Business School. Franck spent 25 years working for the Group Engie. Thus, he started his career at Gaz de France in the engineering department for 7 years and then moved to the Marketing and Sales with different functions in different countries such as France, Czech Republic, Hungary, Netherlands, Italy and UK before joining OMV Petrom. He was appointed member of the OMV Petrom Executive Board as of July 1, 2018 and President of FPPG as of January 30, 2019.
KEEP READINGSzabolcs Ferencz is the Chairman-CEO of FGSZ Natural Gas Transmission Ltd. since February 2019.
Previously, he held the position of SVP MOL Group Corporate Affairs supervising international and domestic governmental relations for Regulatory and Public Affairs, Strategy Development and Corporate Communications. Beforehand, Mr. Ferencz was the CEO and Country Chairman of MOL Romania, a key MOL Group subsidiary. Between 2003 – 2009 he held the position of Vice President for Corporate Communications of MOL Group and was in charge of the overall communications activities of the fast growing Group.
Since 2015 Mr. Ferencz is the Chair of the National Committee of the World Petroleum Council. He is also member of the Advisory Board of the Regional Centre for Energy Policy Research Foundation. Mr. Ferencz is an Associate at the European Round Table for Industry since 2011. He is founding partner of the SEED School for Executive Education and Development based in Budapest.
Mr. Ferencz received his MA in Economics from the University of Regensburg and pursued postgraduate studies in political science.
John has served as VP LNG Origination for Cheniere since 2015 and is responsible for developing long term LNG sales opportunities in the EMEA region. Prior to joining Cheniere, John worked for Shell for almost 15 years in the company’s Gas & Power, LNG supply & trading and Crude Oil trading units in South America, Asia, Europe and Africa. John holds a degree in Civil Engineering from the National University of Rosario, Argentina, and an MBA from the Macroeconomic Studies Centre of Buenos Aires, Argentina.
KEEP READINGBetween 1990 and 1991, Zoltán Áldott was an associate at Creditum Financial Consulting Ltd. Afterwards, between 1992 and 1995, he held various positions at Eurocorp Financial Consulting Ltd. From 1995 to 1997, he was the Manager of MOL’s Privatisation Department and from 1997 until 1999, he was Director of Capital Markets. In 1999, Mr. Áldott served as Director of Strategy & Business Development. From November 2000, he acted as Chief Strategy Officer and then, since June 2001, as Group Chief Strategy Officer. He was the Executive Vice President of MOL Exploration & Production Division between September 2004 and June 2011. Zoltán Áldott acted as the President of INA Management Board between 1 April 2010 and 31 May 2018. Since 2001 til 2018 May he was a member of the MOL EB. As the Chairman of the Supervisory Board he is a permanent invitee to Board of Directors, Remuneration and Risk Management Committee and Sustainable Development Committee meetings.
KEEP READINGEngr. Chichi Emenike has over twenty six (26) years experience in the Oil and Gas Industry spanning across the upstream, midstream and downstream sectors. She holds a Bachelors in Engineering and an MBA in Oil & Gas Management from Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen plus is a Fellow of Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), a certified member with the Council for The Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN), Association of Professional Women Engineers of Nigeria (APWEN) and a founding member Women In Energy Network (WIEN).
She started her early career in the Nigerian Oil & Gas industry as a Project Engineer with Exxon Mobil Nigeria in 1999 and is currently on OML42 in Nigeria in Neconde Energy Limited as the Acting Managing Director as well as the Gas Asset Manager where she is responsible for consolidating and increasing the Asset’s current production of Gas and Crude with a focus on workovers, drilling campaigns and facility uptime with KPOs of value optimization for growth and profitability. She was one of the key leads on the team which secured and signed a Finance, Technical and Services Agreement (FTSA) on OML42 in 2022 which will have investments and injection of financing into the development of the Asset over a fifteen (15) year period.
On the other hand with the Asset’s keen focus on Gas, she is also responsible for driving the company’s Gas business and positioning Neconde as a lead player for developing Gas supply in with the company’s strategic mandate. One of her core focus is around unlocking the Asset’s potential of over 3.8tcf of Gas reserves for increased value optimization for growth and profitability.
Apart from being involved in several technical projects along different parts of the value chain of the industry, she has been engaged in several Corporate Social Responsibility Projects, advocating inclusion and diversity and its relevance to business sustainability as well as serving on different Not-for profit organizations and NGOs. These include but are limited to limited to the Nigerian Gas Association (NGA) (Study Chair of its Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Group), Women in Energy Network (WIEN) as Vice President, Upstream, Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) and others. She remains committed to actively creating opportunities especially for women in Oil and Gas projects whilst also providing Commercial, Technical and Financial advice for women who are seeking to actively participate in the Upstream Oil & Gas industry.
Vladimir Malinov is the Executive Director and Member of the Management Board of the Bulgarian gas transmission system operator Bulgartransgaz since 29th of January 2025.
Mr. Malinov joined Bulgartransgaz as Head of Legal Division in 2010. He was responsible for regulatory affairs and was deeply involved in relations with EU institutions, the company’s TSO certification and unbundling and the implementation of NCs. From March 2018 until April 2024 he was the Executive Director of the company.
From April 2024 until January 2025 Mr. Malinov was the Minister of Energy in two consecutive Caretaker Governments of the Republic of Bulgaria.
Until his appointment as Caretaker Minister, he has been also a Member of the Board of Balkan Gas Hub from January 2019, a Member of the Board of Gastrade S.A. (the operator of the Alexandroupolis LNG Terminal) since January 2021 and a Member of the Board of the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas (ENTSOG) since January 2022.
KEEP READINGMichael Thomadakis is the Strategy & Development Chief Officer of DESFA, since 2020. Formerly, he was the Vice Chairman and Member of the Board of RAE from 2005 to 2015, member of the BoR of ACER, the CEER General Assembly, the Board of MEDREG, the Board of Appeal of ACER and Chairman of the Investment Group of the Energy Charter. He has extensive experience in the development of the gas regulatory framework of the Greek gas market, and deeply involved in corresponding developments in South East Europe, especially in the regulatory framework for several gas infrastructure projects related to the Southern Gas Corridor. Started his carrier in DEPA, were he worked as the contractual administrator of the Gas Procurement contracts from Russia (pipeline) and Algeria (LNG), the LNG transportation contracts, the development of underground gas storage, the derivation of transportation tariffs and on the establishment of the Gas Distribution Companies in Greece. He is a Mechanical Engineer of NTU Athens with a PhD from the same University. He is the author of more than 40 scientific papers and reports and invited lecturer in many events of the energy industry worldwide.
KEEP READINGMr. Dániel Garai has been the CEO of CEEGEX, the Central Eastern European Gas Exchange Ltd. since July 2020. Mr Garai attained his Degrees at the Budapest Business School and University of Pécs. He has been working in the energy industry since 2005, fulfilling senior positions at FŐGÁZ Zrt. in Budapest, and RWE Supply & Trading Switzerland SA in Geneva, Switzerland. As of 2012, he was CFO and Member of the Board of Directors at MET Hungary and afterwards Business Development Director. From November 2019 until his appointment as CEO at CEEGEX, he was the advisor to the CEO of MAVIR Ltd., leading the company’s transformation program.
KEEP READINGGraduated on the Faculty of Mining, Geology and Petroleum Engineering, University of Zagreb in 2006. During professional career, completed several professional training programs in the field of project management, gas equipment and pipelines, management of technological processes on the FSRU vessel and various safety processes of working with liquefied natural gas.
In the period 2002-2006, he completed a series of internships in Crosco – Integrated Drilling & Well Services Co, while from 2007 to 2020 he worked in Plinacro Ltd. – Croatian TSO in all positions: from trainee, pipeline engineer through division manager responsible for development to the director of the Gas Transport Department.
From 2020 he was Director of the Sector for Technical and Operational Affairs at LNG Hrvatska LLC. In 2023 he became Managing Director of the company.
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