About Christos Vaitsis

Europe's Innovation Infrastructure — 12+ Years Building What Startups Need

EIT Health (2016-2025) — Stockholm, Vienna, Remote

Christos joined EIT Health — Europe's largest health innovation initiative with 140+ partner organizations — when the Scandinavian operation consisted of two people and a mandate to build an ecosystem across five countries. Over nine years, he progressed from Innovation Manager to Business Creation Manager to Senior Consultant to Innovation Lead, ultimately supporting 218 companies, of which 107 collectively raised €362M in published lifetime funding.

What he built:

• Founded operations twice — Built Scandinavian infrastructure from scratch (2016), then replicated the founding role as advisor for Austrian Co-Location Centre (2022)
• Deal flow at scale — Personally sourced, screened, and evaluated 181 Scandinavian ventures across Biotech, MedTech, and Digital Health (42 pre-seed, 70 seed, 25 Series A, 5 Series B, 5 Series C)
• Investment connectivity infrastructure — Co-developed the EIT Health Investor Network aggregating 100+ institutional investors across Europe; sourced and prepared 14 companies to the program through 13-section, 51-item institutional due diligence framework
• Program design & delivery — Competed for and won €700K EU funding to lead the Digital Sandbox accelerator; managed €1.5M+ annually in total program budgets; co-authored €1M Mentoring & Coaching Network proposal. Addtionally, co-developed 20+ pan-European Innovation, Incubation & Acceleration programs spanning the entire value chain from teams to scaleups
• Portfolio governance — Strategic oversight of €10M+ innovation project portfolio across 11 companies with 100% expert panel approval rate
• Partnership expansion — Onboarded Helsinki University Hospital, NTNU/Norway Health Tech, Sahlgrenska Science Park, Karolinska University Hospital, Health Tech Hub Copenhagen as institutional partners

Technology Transfer Architecture — Building Systematic Commercialization

ATHENA Research Center (2021-Present) — Athens, Greece

As Head of Innovation & Technology Transfer at Greece's largest AI research institution, Christos designed and implemented the institutional frameworks that most research centers lack: equity allocation at spinoff formation, IP filing expense sharing, proceeds distribution, and board governance models that balance institutional interests with venture growth requirements.

What he created:

• Institutional equity framework — Applied as standard across all spinoffs
• Spinoff creation — Created three companies (Kyklos - digital health, Agora Labs - health data ecosystem, Avisense - XR/AI for connected vehicles); two pending. OmniLoc.ai secured equity investment pre-incorporation
• Board representation — Serves on boards of Avisense and Symbiolabs representing ATHENA's shareholder interests; regular participant in ATHENA Board of Directors meetings providing expert input on innovation strategy and technology transfer
• IP strategy & patents — Created ATHENA's first comprehensive IP strategy; led prosecution of 4 national patents + 1 European patent (first EPO patent ever granted to ATHENA)
• Industry partnerships — 50+ structured meetings (including Pfizer, Google, HP, EY, Mytilinaios, Motor Oil, TERNA, INTRAKOM) resulting in 10-15 signed MoUs and research contracts
• TTO hub creation — Co-founding member of Science Agora, a four-institution Technology Transfer Hub (ATHENA, NCSR Demokritos, AUEB, NTUA) in Athens

European Commission Expert Evaluator — Institutional Verdict Authority

Appointed September 2025

The European Commission appoints independent experts to evaluate research and innovation proposals seeking public funding. Christos holds appointments across various programs, evaluating companies and consortia seeking tens of millions in blended financing.

Recent appointments:

• EIC Accelerator — Evaluating full proposals (50-page business plans, IP/FTO analysis, pitch decks, financial models, LoIs, team CVs) of €17.5M each in blended financing.
• HaDEA Health — Regenerative Medicine proposals (€29.5M total budget allocation)
• EIT Urban Mobility — Urban transformation and mobility innovation programs

ZAZ Ventures — Final Investment Verdict Authority

Senior Consultant (2024-Present)

ZAZ Ventures is Europe's top-ranked EIC Accelerator consultancy with €1.734B raised for clients since 2014 and success rates 4-5x above average. Christos serves as final-stage go/no-go decision authority for proposals seeking up to €17.5M in blended financing.

Karolinska Institutet — Researcher & Course Director (2013-2016)

Before entering innovation infrastructure, Christos was a researcher at Karolinska Institutet (KI), one of the world's top 10 universities in clinical medicine and life sciences. His research focused on Big Data and AI for clinical decision-making, producing 14 peer-reviewed publications and one book chapter (lead authorship on 8), published in PLoS ONE, JMIR Research Protocols, PeerJ, and IEEE CBMS.

As Course Director, he designed and delivered the MSc-level course "Designing eLearning Interventions in Healthcare Education" within the Health Informatics master program. He was appointed by KI as Primary Voting Member of the MedBiquitous Standards Committee — the sole European representative on an international healthcare education standards organization (part of Association of American Medical Colleges - AAMC) that sets standards for healthcare education and competence assessment worldwide (2015-2016).