Dr. Athanassios Karalis is the R&D Specialties Manager in S&B Industrial Minerals, a global minerals and materials group, which is supplying construction, metallurgy, plastics, coatings and various specialty niche sectors. Athanassios (Thanassis) holds a Diploma in Mining and Metallurgical Engineering (National Technical University of Athens, NTUA, 1986) and a PhD in Metallurgy and Materials Technology (NTUA, 2001).
He has a strong experience in Physical and Chemical processing of industrial minerals (Bentonite, Perlite, Silicates) and metallic ores (Bauxite). Other professional education: a)“Advanced Negotiation Skills”, May 2000, Prof. Ingemar Dierickx of INSEAD, b)“The Art of Project Management”, September 2001, MCE, c)“Finance for non-Financial Managers”, February 2002, Athens laboratory of Business Administration (ALBA), d)“Leading Product Development”, Harvard Business School, Executive Education, July 2008.
He has been working for two years (1990-1992) as researcher in NTUA while, in parallel, he was tutoring «Kinetics of heterogeneous chemical reactions – Hydrometallurgical processes”. He joined S&B Industrial Minerals initially as Research Engineer and QA manager of Bentonite Division (1992-2000) and then as Perlite Division R&D manager (2000-2011). Since 2011 he holds the position of the R&D Specialties Manager of Global Marketing Organization at S&B.
Since 1994 he has coordinated nine EC programs (Brite-Euram, FP6, and FP7) and four National programs (funded by the Greek Ministry of Industry).
In 2008 he was selected as Independent Expert/Evaluator of research proposals (FP7) assisting the Research Executive Agency of European Commission (2008-to date), and in 2011 as Reviewer of EC funded projects (2011-to date).
He is Member of the Iron & Steel Society (USA).
