• EXPORT MANAGER •

• Maria Cristina Longo 
  Associate Professor SECS-P / 08 - Business Economics and Management
  Department of Economics and Business, University of Catania
  In possession of the Full Professor National Scientific Qualification

• Silvia Angilella
  Full Professor in SECS-S/06 - Mathematical methods of economy, finance and actuarial sciences

Silvia Angilella is Full Professor in Mathematical Finance. She holds a PhD in Mathematics for Economics and Finance from University of Messina. Chair of the Degree Program in "Corporate Finance" of the University of Catania. She is also member of the national ASN committee for the research field 13/D4 "Mathematical Methods for Economics, Finance and Actuarial Sciences". Her research interests focus on Multicriteria Decision Aid, decision theory, credit scoring and  financial intermediation.  She has published on these topics in international journals. 

• Veronica Benzo
  Researcher in L-LIN/04 - French language

Veronica Benzo is lecturer in French at the Department of Economics and Business and at the Department of Humanistic Science of the University of Catania. She has taught at the French Language TFA. Her research focuses on issues related to teaching French micro-language. In particular she has furthered her research into the fields of French for Business Purposes and Legal French, both from a didactic and linguistic perspective. Moreover she has also focused her research on economic and legal French issues. She works in collaboration both with the local Institutions and with the business sector, and has organized various conferences and events at a European level regarding Multilinguism. She has conducted studies in innovative didactics and is responsible for the “Exerimental Teaching Assistance Lab ” for the Degree Course in Business Economics at the University of Catania. Since 2013 she has organized a Seminar for Professional Development entitled “The Strategic Student” to offer students the opportunity to develop effective study tools. She is the Co-ordinator for LEND Catania. 

• Francesco Drago
  Full Professor in SECS-P/01 - Political Economics 

• Maria Cristina Longo (Committee President)
  Associate Professor SECS-P / 08 - Business Economics and Management

Cristina Longo is Associate Professor of Business Economics and Management at the University of Catania (Italy) where she currently teaches “International Business” and “Channel Management” to graduate students in Business Management Course. She holds a laurea degree with 110 summa cum laude and a Ph.D in Business Administration. She won the prestigious “Business Management Scholarship” by IRI Foundation (Rome) and was Visiting Scholar in the Department of Strategy and Management at INSEAD (Paris). She also was Visiting Professor at the University of Economics Prague (CR), at the Université de Montpellier and Montpellier Business School (France).  In 2018 she has spent a research visiting period at Columbia Business School (NYC) and in 2019 she has been Visiting Professor at the University of Southampton (UK). Currently, she is in the Editorial Advisory Board of Management Decision, of the European Journal of Innovation Management and of the European Journal of International Management and ad-hoc reviewer for international leading journals. She is MIUR Referee for Evaluating Scientific National Projects (PRIN).  and has been invited to participate in the Advisory Board of the European project “MSCA-RISE Sensorsoft”, Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV), Spain. In the past Cristina Longo was Delegate for relations with national and international firms and Delegate for the technology transfer and academic spin-off at the Department of Business and Economics, University of Catania. Her research interests focus on Innovation management & High tech, Technological Standards & Competition, Regulatory Standard & Coopetitive Alliances, Innovative Start-Ups & Incubator; Communities of practices and & Hub-and-Spoke Model for Innovation; Knowledge Management & Dynamic Capabilities, Export strategy, “Made in” Sustainability and Quality Standard for Products Protection, Channel Design & Retail Management​, Sustainable Entrepreneurship and Local Development. 

• Isidoro Mazza 
  Full Professor in SECS-P/03 - Public Economics  

Isidoro Mazza is Professor of Public Finance at the University of Catania. He holds degrees from the University of Catania (Laurea), University of Maryland at College Park (M.A.) and the University of Amsterdam (PhD). He is alumnus of the Tinbergen Institute and his main research interests include: political economy of fiscal federalism, taxation, lobbying, voting participation, policymaking in the cultural sector, voluntary provision of public goods, museums, art market and education. He has been reviewer in several international scientific journals including: European Journal of Political Economy, Journal of Public Economics, International Tax and Public Finance, Journal of Population Economics, Public Choice, Regional Studies, Economics and Governance, Finanzarchiv, Constitutional Political Economy, Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Homo Oeconomicus, Review of Public Economics, Journal of Cultural Economics.

• Ray Garcia
  Buoyant Capital, New York City, USA 

Ray Garcia is the managing director of Buoyant Capital, a global peer advisory think tank addressing the growth challenges of small to medium sized enterprises. The firm coordinates its team of experts to help its clients improve competitiveness through talent management, global market expansion partnership access, technology asset management, capital investment and restructuring. Buoyant Capital was founded in 2000 in New York City and has helped launch several start-up companies and works as an advisor to company founders, CEO’s, and their investors. Ray has over 25 years of experience as a technology entrepreneur, as company CTO co-founder, for four venture-backed companies. Earlier in his career, he worked as an executive for major banks including, Citicorp, Republic National Bank (now HSBC), Bank of America, and as a technology consultant to several large U.S. multi-national corporations. In 2008, he was elected to serve as an executive in resident at MIT Media Lab. Since 2010 he serves on the advisory board of Baruch College Field Center for Entrepreneurship. From 2011 to 2014, he taught an accelerated course in entrepreneurship at the University of Pisa, Italy, School of Economics, to PhD candidates and International MBA executives with a focus on innovation, technology transfer and venture spin-offs. Since 2015 he is serving as a business expert to E.U. Commission Horizon 2020 SME innovation instrument where he will evaluate commercialization grant proposals of technology ventures. He is an author of several business books.

• Francesco Messina
  CEO Centocinquanta srl Catania 

Graduated in Economics at the University of Catania, Francesco Messina began his career at the Administration of the Council of Ministers in the sector of local development under the guidance of Professor Luca Meldolesi. After working there for two years, in 2005 he took on a PhD course in Public Finances, completed it in 2008, earned a Master's Degree in Economics of Arts in Louvain-la-Neuve in Belgium in 2006, and in July 2007 obtained the qualification of a chartered accountant. As early as in 2003, he established CentoCinquanta, a consulting institution in order to exchange know-hows and contacts and create and offer consultancy products for businesses and government bodies. More inclined to the business issues and those related to performance improvement, he is personally involved in training entrepreneurs in leadership, change management and generational handover, team-building in companies, managing and motivating sales networks. Messina takes advantage of his skills in Management Control to understand which objectives to assign to managers and sales networks, and Marketing skills to help companies improve relationship between their employees and customers and suppliers. In 2018 he was entrusted to head the department of Economics of Strategy in the Global World at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences. He is also the author of articles in specialized magazines.