Dr Beatriz Garcia is an expert in international cultural policy and mega-events. She is Associate Director of the Centre for Cultural Value, member of the Culture & Olympic Heritage Commission – International Olympic Committee and former member of the European Capital of Culture (ECoC) Selection Panel. Beatriz has been at the forefront of research on the rhetoric, impact and long-term legacy of culture-led regeneration interventions since 1999, researching the medium to long-term legacy of every European Capital of Culture since their launch in 1985. She directed and is the author of Impacts 08: ECoC Research Programme, the 30-year assessment of ECoC Success Factors & long-term Effects (European Parliament) or the International framework of good practice in research and delivery of ECoCs (European Commission).

Sylvain Pasqua is a senior expert in the European Commission, where he has been working since 2002 as a policy officer in the Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture.

Sylvain has been the team leader in charge of coordinating the "European Capital of Culture" Action since 2012. In this capacity, Sylvain is responsible for the coordination of the selection, monitoring and evaluation of the European Capitals of Culture.

Sylvain was also involved in the preparation and negotiation of the new EU Creative Europe programme (2021-2027) and is now working on its implementation. This programme aims at promoting cultural and linguistic diversity and cultural heritage as well increasing the competitiveness of the cultural and creative sectors in Europe.

The internationally renowned cultural manager and programme maker comes from Döbeln and has managed outstanding cultural and theatre festivals in Europe and Germany in recent years.

Born in Döbeln in 1968, Stefan Schmidtke is a German cultural manager with a wealth of international start-up and work experience. His career includes founding and managing the Theaterformen festival in Hanover and Braunschweig, setting up and managing the programme department of the European Capital of Culture 2011 in Tallinn and his many years of work as a curator at the Wiener Festwochen festival, most recently as director of drama there. From 2016 to 2018, he was responsible for developing the programme and events department at the Humboldt Forum in Berlin.

Since Dezember 2022 Stefan Schmidtke is the CEO of the ECoC Chemnitz 2025 team.

Mariateresa Cascino is from Matera and she holds a degree with honours in Communication Sciences, with a specialization in marketing. She is a journalist and marketing communication specialist. She gained professional experience in Italy and in the USA (Boston and New York) working in institutional and corporate communications and on expansion and internationalization projects in the American market. She has created marketing plans, carried out feasibility studies and managed public relations for investors interested in both Northern America and Italy. She is a Europhile, and has worked for the Department for Public Administration, dealing with information about the structural funds of Objective 1 Regions. She has also developed integrated communication and advertising campaigns to support institutional communications about the ERDF structural funds of the Basilicata Region.

Manos Vougioukas is Secretary-General of the European Cultural Tourism Network (ECTN) non-profit international association, the only pan-European Network that brings together the cultural heritage and tourism sectors to work together for sustainable cultural tourism development and promotion. He has established, managed, and coordinated 12 EU co-funded projects on sustainable and cultural tourism during the past 25 years. He is the instigator and editor of the ECTN ‘Charter for Sustainable Cultural Tourism’. He served as a member of the Stakeholders Committee for European Year of Cultural Heritage 2018, selected by the European Commission DG EAC. He holds BSc and MSc degrees and a Diploma in Economics. He has worked in consultancy in several countries. He has served as an evaluator for the EU Cohesion Fund, External service and Interreg programmes. He is a member of the Tourism Society, Europa Nostra, Interpret Europe, Europeana Network, as well as a Fellow of the Institute of Travel and Tourism.

Rita Orlando has a Master's degree in Architecture and a long experience in large scale projects with social impact, both in Italy and abroad. Since 2003 she's been working on urban and social regeneration projects, coordinating multidisciplinary and international teams. In 2009 she founded "Mimers, design al plurale", a cultural NGO that brings together over 40 CCI freelancers and industries. In 2014, she joined the Matera 2019 team for the city's successful bid to become European Capital of Culture, managing social innovation projects and the artistic residency programme at European level. Since 2016 she has been the manager of the Open Design School, a participatory and innovative design laboratory and partner of the New European Bauhaus, which has produced over 50 urban regeneration projects, installations and game design, involving over 100 professionals and around 2,000 citizens in design by doing and DIY workshops. For Matera 2019, she was also the project manager of the pillar project I-Dea, the archive of archives, a series of international contemporary art exhibitions and a supporting programme of performances and workshops. In recent years, she has been involved in innovative learning processes based on learning by doing and peer-to-peer learning for the cultural and creative industries. She currently manages the legacy of Matera 2019, is responsible for the cultural planning of the Matera Basilicata 2019 Foundation and is a strategic consultant for cultural foundations, NGOs and municipalities on cultural planning, artistic residency programmes, co-creation processes and social innovation.

Alan Vella has considerable first-hand knowledge of institutional work environments, having occupied different positions at the European Commission and at the United Nations as from 2006 onwards. He currently acts as call coordinator and project manager within the Competitiveness and Internationalisation Sector of the European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA). 

Previously, he was employed at the European Commission`s Tourism Unit with policy development and communication-related duties, and was responsible for civil society engagement within the United Nations Climate Change Secretariat (UNFCCC). Mr. Vella was also a guest lecturer on EU Tourism Policy at the University of Sorbonne in Paris, and has represented the European Commission as moderator, speaker and/or rapporteur in several events across Europe. 

Mr. Vella`s career also saw him occupy different managerial posts in Malta, his home country, the last being at the Malta Environment and Planning Authority, the Ministry for Tourism and Culture and the Malta Tourism Authority.  He acted as Malta`s UNESCO National Focal Point for Periodic Reporting of World Heritage Sites, and was also a freelance journalist on tourism issues in “The Sunday Times”, Malta`s leading Sunday newspaper, winning Malta`s “Tourism Journalist of the Year Award” in 2001. 

He holds a Masters degree in Tourism Planning and Development (with distinction) from the University of Surrey, United Kingdom.

Nuno Almeida has a PhD in Business Management, specialising in Marketing, from the University of Coimbra.
He was President of the Technical-Scientific Council of the School of Tourism and Technology of the Sea (ESTM) of the Polytechnic Institute of Leiria and was a member of the Coordinating Committee of CiTUR - Centre for Research, Development and Innovation in Tourism - Leiria Hub. He was Coordinator of the Masters in Tourism Marketing and Promotion. Responsible for areas of innovation and entrepreneurship, he has been on several teaching missions to international universities in various European and South American countries.
He also provides services in the area of marketing (PSER) and R&D+I projects developed under Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) programmes.

Dora Kanizsai-Nagy, Monitoring Officer in the Veszprém-Balaton 2023 ECoC team, holds a master’s degree in International Relations. She coordinated the development of the Monitoring Platform for the ECoC programme and is currently engaged in the transformation of the ECoC’s web based solutions into a multi-region destination management system. Previously she designed and implemented social innovation projects and has extensive experience in nonprofit management and tourism.  

Rui Barroso, holds a BSc (5Y) in Computer Science and Engineering by Instituto Superior Técnico and MSc in Computer Science and Engineering by Nova School of Science and Technology; entrepreneur; an active member of regional interface organizations in Alentejo (ADRAL, PACT) and of the project management association (APOGEP);
Competences and certifications in project management and IT service management (ITIL). Experienced in regional development and digital tranformation strategies, acting as Board Member at ADRAL (Alentejo Regional Development Agency). Since 2004 with a focus on ICT infrastructures and services to promote regional development supported in digital strategy. 
Design and implementation of digital regional strategies, managed services, FDI and multipurpose projects, RIS3 development activities, Alentejo Central Energy Efficiency Strategy (eeef.eu), FABLAB development, Regional Transfer System, ICT shared services regional centre, e-Health projects, Smart Connected Communities and Digital Agenda initiative, Smart City and Co2 reduction in Évora, National Startup Network member (RNI), EU Digital Agenda 2020, Broadband ENGAGE project.

Iveta has been involved in destination management and setting up destinations in Slovakia for 15 years and thanks to her there is a legislative environment for the functioning of destination management in Slovakia. She is a visionary, a strategist, a connector, with an eye for detail, a human approach and a willingness to help. In 2008 she founded the first destination management organisation in Slovakia. From 2010 to 2016, she led the destination management organisation Visit Košice after initiating its establishment. She has been a consultant for the last 4 years and describes herself as a designer of places and experiences because design thinking is the approach she was born with.

When a destination approaches her to help it, she first needs to understand it so she can reimagine it, organize it differently to make it work better for the benefit of the visitor and the benefits of the destination partners. She has the courage to innovate, to be where no one has been before and to apply creativity as a tool to differentiate herself. Destination management appeals to her because of its people work, complexity and systematic approach. She loves to analyse data and find in it arguments for the objectives she proposes in destinations. She dislikes injustice and wasting potential, which is why you will find her as a passionate activist in many Slovak nature conservation and cultural heritage initiatives. She cannot imagine her life without nature. She lives in the mountains where she actively spends her free time.

Povilas Mintautas is an information specialist for Kaunas Artists' House and a former monitoring specialist for Kaunas - European Capital of Culture 2022. Povilas specializes in developing digitized monitoring systems to gather and analyze cultural data. His experience includes the development of an internet platform for culture and art operators in Kaunas, managing Kaunas - European Capital of Culture 2022 external impact research, carrying out various citywide cultural field researches. As a monitoring specialist he believes that analyzing and understanding cultural field brings many important insights on how to improve culture services in the city and how to move forward towards data-based policy making.

Experienced project manager with a proven history of working at international level. Strong analytical skills and deep expertise in research studies, public affairs, socio-economic studies, impact studies, cultural studies, territorial development and tourism consulting. 

A repentant Jazz guitarist, a musical reviewer and keen on cinema, his main activity is communication. His first experience in a press office was for Ray Charles’s concert held in Matera in 1992. However, at that time he did not yet know that it would be his job. 
  
Graduated in Communication Sciences, he started to work as a journalist in 1991 and he enrolled in the National Register of Journalists in 2001. 
  
He has been working for the Region of Basilicata press office since 1996 where he works now. From 2010 to 2015 he was in charge of the institutional communication of the Municipality of Matera and at the same time he was in charge of the press office of the Matera 2019 Committee for the candidacy of Matera as the European Capital of Culture. Thanks to this experience he wrote the book “Le città invincibili – L’esempio di Matera 2019” (Editrice Universosud – 2017). 
  
In 2018 he was appointed as the coordinator of the press office of Matera – Basilicata Foundation 2019by the Director of the Press Office of the Council of the Region of Basilicata. From february 2020 he has returned to work in the Basilicata Region and he is the press office manager of Apt, Territorial Promotion Agency of Basilicata. 
  
He is the founder and the editorial director of EcocNews, the only European webmagazine online about news from capitals of culture. 

Dora Gomes is a doctoral student in Tourism and holds a master's degree in Relational Marketing. With an academic background in destination branding, she integrates her theoretical knowledge with practical insights gained through professional consultancy experience. At present, she actively contributes to the CulTourData project, focusing specifically on the development of the European Capital of Culture observatory (ECoC Watch). 

Emiliano has over 20 years’ experience as EU project manager, researcher, and trainer.  Born and raised in Italy, where he earned an M.A. in Political Philosophy at the University of Genoa, Emiliano has worked for many years in social enterprises in Genoa and Rome, working for the development of inclusive tourism information points and mobility services, as an accessibility auditor, developing plans for the removal of architectural barriers, as speaker and lecturer. Since 2015 he lives in Brussels working as researcher, project manager and lobbyist for ENAT. He has participated in more than 30 EU funded projects on all aspects of the life of people with disability and on accessible tourism, focusing on destination development, vocational education and training, e-learning, and the use of digital media. He saves time to pursue his career as a musical artist.

As a senior project manager at CWE mbH, Boris Kaiser has experience in designing the content and managing large-scale transformation projects (currently in the automotive sector) as well as European projects in the field of tourism and at the interfaces of industry, creative industries and society.

He holds a bachelor's degree in cultural and media management and is currently studying part-time in the master's programme in sustainability engineering. In addition, as an active member of the C2C NGO, he advocates for Cradle to Cradle and the strengthening of a true circular economy. He runs professional workshops, especially Design Sprints.