3 Alba Graduates in the 2019 Fortune Greece 40 under 40 List

Fortune Greece just released the 40 under 40 list for 2019 showcasing 40 entrepreneurs under 40 years old that innovate, stand out and make a difference. This annual curated list includes start-uppers, teams and next generation family business leaders with a vision to deepen their footprint in the local and international entrepreneurial scene. According to the Fortune Greece research team, entrepreneurs listed demonstrate innovative leadership, international growth, versatility, persistence, knowledge, talent and optimism.

The 2019 list includes 3 Alba Graduates and Entrepreneurs. Ilias Vartholomaios (28) and Athina Polina Dova (30) are in the list for the second consecutive year. Athina and Ilias co-founded Owiwi  in 2014  following their graduation from the Alba MSc in International Business Management in 2013. Athina and Ilias met at Alba and worked hard on their idea to introduce serious gaming techniques for personnel recruitment. The team has raised up to date 500.000 euro in funding, received international awards, and is about to join the SAP StartupSelect#HR program and the New York based Numa Accelerator. In 2018 they entered the Turkish market and in 2019 they are expanding to the Latin American one. Owiwi’s serious gaming tool promises to shorten interview length by 50%, reduce the number of interviews by 47% and increase employee soft skills by 30%.

Kostas Pardalis (39), co-founder and CEO of Blendo joins the list for the first time in 2019. Kostas is a data engineer and researcher from the Technical University of Athens. He studied at Alba for the MSc in Strategic Human Resources Management and graduated in 2010, helping him lead the business side of the startup. Kostas and his team help companies turn their data into actions, having built the ultimate data management platform that connects, reshapes and delivers actionable data. Blendo is a modern ETL (Extract-Transform-Load) cloud based solution. The team has tripled the number of employees, while it has been growing by over 100% in the past two years. Kostas’ vision is to make Blendo a trusted brand for the international market and, especially, the USA.

In the #AlbaEntrepreneurs section of our website you may find a growing and non-exhaustive list of our alumni entrepreneurs and their businesses.