Professor Zenios has been the Rector of the University of Cyprus since 2002, and is serving a four year term as President of UNICA (Universities of the Capitals of Europe). He also served as the first Chairman of the Cyprus Rectors Conference, that was established in 1994 under his initiative, Vice Chairman and Chairman of the Cyprus NARIC, and is the Vice Chairman of the Cyprus Science Foundation.

Dr Zenios received a BSc in Mathematics from London University in 1980, a BEng in Electrical Engineering from Council of Engineering Institutions in 1982, MA and PhD in Engineering-Management Systems from Princeton University in 1986, and an Honorary MA from University of Pennsylvania in 1992. Prior to joining the University of Cyprus he was a tenured faculty member of the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

He is known for his work in computational finance and financial services, high-performance and parallel computations, and operations research. In his career he authored three books, edited sixteen books and journal issues, and (co)authored over 160 scholarly articles in some of the premier journals in the field. He holds two US patents on financial engineering methods, his work has been reproduced in edited volumes, textbooks and encyclopedias, and his book with Pat Harker on the Performance of Financial Institutions (Cambridge University Press) was translated in Chinese. In 2006 he received the EURO Excellence in Research Award by the European Federation of Operations Research Societies. His book with Yair Censor Parallel Optimization (Oxford University Press) received the 1999 ICS prize of The Institute of Operations Research and the Management Sciences, and his article with A. Soteriou on Service Quality received a Best Paper Award from the Decision Sciences Institute in 1999.  In 2000 he was selected as a Marie Curie Fellow by the European Commission.

Dr Zenios served as consultant for several financial institutions and Government agencies, including Union Bank of Switzerland, World Bank, Federal National Mortgage Association and Central Bank of Cyprus. He serves on the editorial board of seven journals and is editor for two volumes in Elsevier’s series Handbooks of Finance.

With his wife Nina they climbed Kilimanjaro reaching Uhuru Peak at 5895 mt. at 8.20 am.

Email: zenioss@ucy.ac.cy 

“It gives me pleasure to send a congratulatory message to the University of Latvia, a valued and active member of the UNICA Network on the occasion of its 90^th anniversary.

Within context of the current economic crisis, our academic institutions are called upon to set new goals in research, innovation and economic growth. At the same time, we have to join forces and build new bridges of collaboration in order to help our societies to overcome the crisis. The University of Cyprus views the University of Latvia as a valued collaborator ”

Innovation and Economic Growth: knowledge regions in small countries