Speakers

His professional experience, accumulated in his over 20 years of activity in fields such as management, railway business development, project management and implementation, research or academic, have allowed him to have representative positions in private or state companies in Romania and Europe, in the railway industry and operation field.
He was responsible, individually or in complex teams, for strategies of procurement, restructuring, market repositioning or integration in the structure demanded by the shareholders or the tutelary authority of companies such as: Romvag S.A (Romania), Karsdorfer Eisenbahn – KEG (Private Railway from Germany), Autoritatea Feroviară Română (AFER).
He created, developed and managed railway engineering companies such as Forschung Mess-und Daten-Technik Zentrum (Germany) and Sistematic Engineering (Romania), and represented the Romanian Railway Company in the Managing Board for Applied Research and Drafting of International Railway Norms within the European Railway Research Institute – ERRI (the Netherlands) – the Research Body of UIC (International Railway Union).
In February 2015 he was selected after an international procedure as Board Member and CEO of the Romanian Railway Company -CFR SA.
In August 2015 he was proposed as vice-president of Community of European Railways -CER
From November 17 until the 7th of July he was the Romanian Minister of Transport.

Mrs. Carmen Filipescu, currently Director of International Affairs Regiotrans, graduated from Polytechnic Institute of Bucharest, Faculty of Transport and has extensive experience in rail passenger transport, mainly in commercial/ international law. During her activity at CFR Calatori, Mrs. Carmen Filipescu held several management positions both within the company and within international professional organisations to which CFR Calatori is a full member, such as: Director of International Affairs, Deputy Director General, Director of International Affairs and External Financing. She is Representative in the European/ World General Assembly and the Passenger Forum of International Union of Railways (UIC) and Representative of CER (European Community of Railway Undertakings and Infrastructure Managers) at level of “Assistants” and “General Directors”.
Since 2000 Carmen Filipescu is Vice President of CIV Commission of Passenger Transport Law to the International Committee of Transport (CIT) and since 2008 she is President of SERG (South East European Group of UIC) – Rail Passenger Activity.

Mr. Stanciu is the CEO of Alstom Romania (97% owned by Alstom Holdings, France), Bulgaria & Rep. of Moldova.
He has full responsibility of the Romanian market: all customers – Romanian Railways (Infra, Freight and Passengers), Bucharest Metro (Metrorex) and the 14 cities where there is a tramway network, reporting to the South-East Europe and North Africa – Middle East Region Vice-President. In addition, he has full responsibility of the all product lines development – rolling stock, signaling, infrastructure, services and turnkey projects, reporting to the respective Operations Vice-Presidents. Among some of the main achievments: saved the Bucharest Metro Maintenance Contract from termination; Successfully transferred and integrated 1,200 people from Metrorex to Alstom; Transformed the Romanian Unit from a state owned business set up to a regular Alstom Business Unit; Completely overhauled 4 depots and a components factory; Increased productivity from cca 35% up to 78%. Previously he was the CEO of Magnetto Wheels Romania, General Manager of Schlumberger / RMS* and Irritec s.a. Gabriel Stanciu has a M. Sc. in Electronics & Telecommunications, University „Politehnica” of Bucharest and holds a Executive MBA from ASEBUSS-University of Washington Business School, Bucharest and Seattle.

Mr. Libor Lochman has been Executive Director of CER since 1st January 2012. Libor Lochman, born in 1963 in Czechoslovakia, graduated from the Transport University in Zilina and has a doctorate in electronics from the West-Bohemian University Plzen. He has a strong background in Control-Command and signalling systems. Prior to his role as CER Deputy Executive Director and leader of technical affairs (2007-2011), he acted as director of the Railway Test Centre, a facility for testing European rolling stock, infrastructure and signalling components, in Prague (2000-2005).

Mr. Robson is a time-served railway man having worked in the industry for 39 years. During this time he has held various senior positions both in the UK and in Europe including that of Secretary General of the European Rail Infrastructure Managers (EIM). In the UK Michael Robson has experience of working at a senior level in an integrated railway, British Rail, a private stock market listed infrastructure company, Railtrack, and a company limited by guarantee and privately financed, Network Rail, where he was responsible for developing and implementing the Network Rail policy on European issues.
During his 7 years working in Europe, he gained an excellent knowledge of how the European institutions work along with developing an excellent network of contacts. He was on the Board of the European Railway Agency (ERA) where he was involved in developing the strategy of the ERA and in reviewing the progress of the development of TSIs. During his career, he has been involved in Operations, Performance, Timetabling, and Contract Management, Asset Management, Funding, Technical Specification of Interoperability (TSI), Passenger and Freight Marketing and other retail activities in addition to the usual General Management and Project work. Michael Robson is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Transport & Logistics and the Institute of Management.

In 1994, he graduated from the “Politehnica” Bucharest, Faculty of Transport, Section Rolling Stock, and had a diploma in mechanical engineering. Marius Chiper has began his activity as locomotive engineer in former SNCFR in 1994, and he had an technical evolution as Technical Inspector at AFER, Chief of Railway Division at an private Railway Undertaking, Project manager and Chief of Project Management Unit at CFR. Currently he is General Manager of CFR SA

Mr. Marin ALDEA was born on 19 August 1965. He has graduated from the Faculty of Manufacturing Engineering of Politehnica University of Bucharest and from the Faculty of Finance and Accounting of Athenaeum University of Bucharest. He holds a master’s degree in the Management of public services companies from the Faculty of Commerce of the Bucharest University of Economic Studies. He has worked from 1989, as Technological engineer, with a couple of state companies (Lathe Plant, Târgovişte and the Institute of Research and Design for Manufacturing Technologies “Chema Proiect S.A.”, Bucharest), and from 1991 with METROREX S.A., as Senior Engineer, Head of Planning – Strategy Department, Management of Operations Director, Strategy, Planning and Resources Director.
As of December 2015, he is General Director of METROREX S.A.

From 1997 to 2000, he worked as Service Engineer at IBS, Austria. From 2000 to 2003, he was Technical Manager at Swietelsky. Since 2003 he is the General Manager of Wiebe and was elected President of the Romanian Railway Industry Association (AIF).

Mrs. Price is Manager, European Affairs, for the International Union of the Wagon Keepers (UIP), where she deals with the relations with the European Commission, European Parliament, European Railway Agency and the media, influences technical and policy decision-making at Sector and European Levels, and develops strategies for policy and research for freight rail industry and rail transport in general.
She holds a PhD in Trans-European Networks – Transport Cohesion of the High-Speed Rail Network in South-West Europe from the University of Oxford, Transport Studies Unit, School of Geography and the Environment. She was a stagiaire at the European Commission, DGTREN (now DG MOVE), Unit Intermodality and Logistics Brussels, Belgium where she worked on the following Dossiers: Consultation Paper on Security in International Transport, Intermodal Loading Unit, Freight Integrator, Marco Polo Programme, INTERMODA Project.

Mr. Szentes graduated in 1989 from the Faculty of Transports – Department of Transport Technology and Railway Remote Operations of the University Politehnica of Bucharest. He also completed several post-graduate classes, has a master’s degree in Project Management at SNSPA Bucharest and a PhD in Transports Engineering.
He held various positions at the Romanian National Railways Company – the Regional Division of Brașov and at the National Railway Training and Qualification Centre – CENAFER among which: project manager, expert-trainer, manager of CCIPTFT Centre CENAFER Brașov. Since 2012 he has been part of SNTFC “CFR Călători” SA where he has held positions such as: operations manager, international and institutional relations manager, consultant and member of the board of directors. Currently Iosif Szentes is the general manager of SNTFC “CFR Călători” S.A.

Among other tasks he acted as secretary to ERRAC – the European Rail Research Advisory Council to the EC and has coordinated a number of EC funded rail research project such as GLOBAL VIEW, ERRAC ROADMAP and FOSTER-RAIL and has been involved in a number of other EC funded projects such as TRANSSLO, TRANSNEW, SPECTRUM, HERMES, MARATHON, SETRIS and REFINET. He has been member of the Multi-modal ETP Task Force preparing the co-modal Infrastructure Roadmap presented to the European Commission in June 2013 and is currently involved in the South East Europe Alliance for Rail Innovation SEESARI.

Giorgio Travaini as Shift2Rail Head of Research & Innovation a.i. is responsible for coordination of the JU’s programme with a view to ensuring that the activities contribute to the fulfilment of the objectives of the S2R Master Plan. Prior to this posting, Giorgio Travaini was Senior Corporate advisor at UNIFE – the association of the European rail industry – advising the General Director on strategic topics, and liaising with the Shift2Rail Founding Members. He had been coordinating since 2010 the preparation phase of Shift2Rail, that lead to the JU regulation proposals of the European Commission.

10 years in different logistics and forwarding companies in Europe gave him a solid logistics background and enabled him understanding, organizing and implementing logistic processes, meeting the real needs of the market. During the last five years he was director for multimodal logistics within the GEFCO group, responsible for the development of multimodal business all over Europe, with a strong focus on Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia.

Mr. Olsson has worked in the railway sector since 1991. He has had several leading positions, in Banverket and later in Trafikverket. The experience goes from Technical Director and Regional Director in the Sothern Region to being responsible for the Research and Development coordination in Banverket. After that, still ongoing, he is Chief Strategist at the DG Central Strategic Function, with a special responsibility for rail related European research and Innovation. He is leading Trafikverket´s work in Shift2Rail, where he is member of the Governing Board as well as holding other positions. Among other commitments, he is chairing UIC Research and Innovation Coordination Group and are a member of the ERRAC Steering Committee and also a member of EURNEX Advisory Board.
Mr. Olsson is a M.Sc in civil engineering, has Licentiate degree in Transportation and have several years of studies in corporate economics.

During 1988-1998, he held various managerial positions at CFR/SNCFR, in the field of Exploitation and Commercial. During 1998-2005, he was Commercial Manager at CFR Marfă, the national freight operator. Starting 2005, Sorin Chinde has been General Manager of Grup Feroviar Roman SA (GFR), becoming involved in all the projects developed by the private operator, as well as those related to the activity of GFR partners, part of Grampet.

Tony Berkeley is a member of the board of directors of the European Rail Freight Association and vice president of AllRail, the association of independent freight and passenger operators in Europe.
Mr. Berkeley is the president of the UK Rail Freight Group. As a construction engineer, he has been involved in many projects in the field, including the construction of the Mine Canal. Mr. Berkeley is an enthusiastic supporter of the railways and the need to improve the efficiency of the rail transport sector and the services provided to customers by reducing costs.
Tony Berkeley is a member of the European Parliament House of Lords where he discusses transportation issues.

Mr Haltuf is an independent expert and project manager. His working experiences include various positions at the Czechoslovak and Czech Railways (railway transport technology), then international Affairs – UIC activities within East –West Task Force, special projects and pan-European Transport Corridors. He worked for several companies related with railway system as an advisor for international affairs, projects on information technologies and strategic development. Nowadays Mr Haltuf is a specialist focused on international activities and projects. He is especially focused on operation management of RUs and IMs, TSIs (TAP and TAF). His previous working experiences included various positions at the Czechoslovak and Czech Railways (railway transport technology), then international Affairs – UIC activities within East –West Task Force, special projects and pan-European Transport Corridors. He worked for several companies related with railway system as an advisor for international affairs, projects on information technologies and strategic development.
His consultancy is also related to companies and organizations outside of the Czech Republic, e.g. FS (Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane), EPAL (European Pallet Association), and many others.

Mr. Jost graduated from the Technical University of Darmstadt (Germany) in 1988 and is licensed in business administration and mechanical engineering.
Frank Jost joined the EU in 1996 where he was responsible for the strategy for opening up the rail market since 2004, especially with the economic aspects of rail transport. His most important projects are the infrastructure use tax, the accession of the Western Balkan countries and the economic rectification of the states with debts. As chairman of a working group of transport ministry officials, Mr Jost supports the accession of these states to the rail sector.

Mr. LeermakersIs the Director of the Technical Department of OTIF (Bern, Switzerland), responsible for the development of European railway legislation in accordance with the technical annexes of COTIF, APTI and ATMF.
During 2007-2012, he was a Project Officer at the European Railway Agency (in Valenciennes, France) in the ITS (Interoperability Technical Specifications) section and worked on the development of rolling stock according to the TSI. He was also responsible for the revision of the TSI on safety in railway tunnels, the revision procedure of the noise TSI, and was a member of the LOC & PAS STI.

General Secretary of EURNEX, is a railway expert with more than 11 years of experience in modelling railway systems, logistics systems and high-speed railway systems. He has a degree on Civil Engineering by the Polytechnic University of Valencia and a Master of Science (railway logistics) by the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) Stockholm. He has been manager and core scientist of several railway research projects at the TU Berlin, Department of Track and Railway Operations. In 2012 the VELWagon project coordinated by Dr. Carrillo received from the Swedish Traffic Administration Trafikverket, Swedish Maritime Administration and Vinnova the prize “Best Green Corridor Project”.