Goldt h e b u s i n e s s m a g a z i n e o f c y p r u s

5 291295 000577

0 0 0 0 1 >

ISSUE 51 JUNE 14 - JUly 13, 2015PRICE €4.95

Integrated ICt SolutIonS for your buSIneSS

onestopSolutIonS

GOLDT H E B U S I N E S S M A G A Z I N E O F C Y P R U S

5 291295 000577

0 0 0 0 1 >

ISSUE 51 JUNE 14 - JULY 13, 2015PRICE €4.95

LEADING COMPANIES IN LIMASSOL

PlusINTERVIEWS, NEWS & OPINIONGeorge AgathangelouAndreas AthinodorouAlexandra Attalides Marios Chiromerides Avgoustinos Constantinides Andrey DashinCostas Galatariotis Klas GierowNicholas Hadjiyiannis Dinos Ioannides Demetra Kalogerou Philippa Kelly Philippos MannarisAndreas Neocleous Marios Panayides Phidias PilidesAnu SaarelaDespina Theodosiou

POWERING THE CYPRUS ECONOMY

PRESENTS

4 | GOLD | The Business Magazine of Cyprus

+LEADING COMPANIES IN LIMASSOL

150150150150150T H E B U S I N E S S M A G A Z I N E O F C Y P R U S

I S S U E 5 1 J U N E 1 4 - J U L Y 1 3 , 2 0 1 5

C O N T E N T S6 | EDITORIAL

8 | BUSINESS BRIEFINGEconomic & Business Highlights of the past month 12 | MY WAY Andreas Athinodorou’s management style

13 | FIVE MINUTES WITH… Demetra Kalogerou

14 | THEY SAID WHAT?A selection of memorable recent quotes

16 | Putting Provident Funds on the MAPThe Multi-Employer Aon Hewitt Provident Fund

20 | 2018 Is Just Around the CornerPhilippa Kelly on International Financial Reporting Standard IFRS 9

23 | The 11th CFO Management ForumLooking ahead to the conference

24 | Digital is InevitableMTN’s conference on the integration of telecoms with IT

OPINION19 | Ctrl+Alt+DeleteBy Andrey Dashin

22 | Matchmaking for BusinessBy Marios Chiromerides

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT53 | 150+ Leading Companies in Limassol98 | Limassol Marina: One Year OnThe groundbreaking waterfront project

100 | Bringing People TogetherNicholas Hadjiyiannis, Chairman of the Cooperative Central Bank

102 | 10 years “By Your Side”Carrefour Cyprus celebrates 10 years in Cyprus

104 | Northern LightsHow the Nordic countries became an economic and social model

106 | Turning the PageThe Cyprus-Kuwait Business Asso-ciation

109 | BOOKSHELFFive of the best new business titles

110 | IN GOOD COMPANYAuditing the life of employees at BAT Cyprus

112 | MY COLLECTIONPhidias Pilides’ classic cars

116 | LUNCH WITH GOLDAlexandra Attalides, Acting Head

in Cyprus

119 | BUSINESS CLASSDespina Panayiotou Theododiou, President of WISTA Cyprus, on her most memorable travel expe-riences

120 | WHAT’S ONGold’s guide to the best cultural events

122 | A DAY IN THE LIFEDinos Ioannides

COVER STORY

29 | 150+ Leading Companies in Limassol

30 | Limassol Calling!Interview with LCCI Chairman

Costas Galatariotis32 | 150+ Leading Companies

in LimassolThe list

SPECIAL OFFERSubscribe today

for just €90 and get an annual subscription

to both Gold & IN Business Call us on

(+357) 22505555

OFFER INCLUDES

FREE ACCESS TO

DIGITAL EDITIONS

112

110

13

116

6 | GOLD | The Business Magazine of Cyprus

| EDITORIAL |

John Vickers,Chief Editor

john@imhbusiness.com

When Second is First

icosia may be the capital of Cyprus and the seat of government but when it comes to the economy, the residents of the island’s second-largest city have every reason to claim that Limassol is

the real driving force behind the country’s success. International business, shipping and tourism are the country’s three main economic sectors; the first two are almost entirely Limassol-based, while the city earns a major slice of the lucrative tourism market.For our cover story in this issue, we return to a listing that we first compiled in Decem-ber 2013. Then, we presented over 120 Limassol-based companies active in all sectors. Now, we have expanded the list to more than 150, in recognition of the fact that busi-ness in the city has grown, despite the effects of the crisis that affected the whole island more than two years ago. In addition to speaking to Costas Galatariotis, Chairman of the Limassol Chamber of Commerce & Industry, which has played a key role in promoting Limassol for more than half a century, we also asked senior figures from a number of Limassol-based business associations for their views on why their home base continues to deserve its nickname ‘the dynamo of the Cyprus economy’.Last month we introduced our redesigned magazine to you and I am delighted to report that your response has been extremely positive. In fact, we have never received so many e-mails and calls from readers in Cyprus and abroad since we launched Gold in April 2011. Thank you for making the effort to contact us. In addition to our cover story, this month we present a wide variety of interviews and features covering a broad spectrum of topics and sectors from AON Hewitt’s new Provident Fund (page 16), Carrefour Cy-prus’ 10th anniversary (page 102), the newly-formed Cyprus-Kuwait Business Association (page 106) and Nordic cooperation (page 104) to Limassol Marina’s first year (page 98), the future of the Cyprus Cooperative Movement (page 100) and the forthcoming new International Financial Reporting Standard (page 20). In addition, Phidias Pilides, President of the Cyprus Chamber of Commerce & Indus-try, enthuses about his classic car collection (page 112), Andreas Athinodorou, CEO of the Aspen Trust Group, shares his management secrets (page 12), Alexandra Attalides, Acting head of the European Parliament office in Cyprus, chats about politicians and more over lunch (page 116), Despina Panayiotou Theodosiou, President of WISTA Cyprus, talks about her most memorable travel experiences (page 119), and Dinos Io-annides, DHL Country Manager, tells us about life at work and at home in ‘A Day in the Life’ (page 122). Moreover, we have opinion pieces from Andrey Dashin, Founder of ForexTime (page 19) and Marios Chirome-rides, Managing Director of Connecor Investments (page 22) and our guide to what’s on over the next month. Enjoy it!

MANAGING DIRECTOR George Michail

GENERAL MANAGER Daphne Roditou Tang

MEDIA MANAGERElena Leontiou

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF John Vickers

JOURNALISTSKyriakos Demetriou, Effy Pafitis

CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS ISSUE Marios Chiromerides, Andrey Dashin,

Andrew Lumley-Holmes

ART DIRECTION Anna Theodosiou

SENIOR DESIGNERAlexia Petrou

PHOTOGRAPHY Jo Michaelides

MARKETING EXECUTIVE Kevi Chishios

SALES & BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT EXECUTIVE

Stavros EpifaniouADVERTISING EXECUTIVES

Irene Georgiou, Christopher ConstantinouOPERATIONS MANAGER

Voulla NicolaouSUBSCRIPTIONSMyria Neophytou

PRINTERS Cassoulides Masterprinters

CONTACT5 Aigaleo St., Strovolos 2057, Nicosia, Cyprus

Mailing address: P.O.Box 21185, 1503, Nicosia, Cyprus

Tel: +357 22505555, Fax: +357 22679820e-mail: gold@imhbusiness.com

subscriptions: goldsubscriptions@imhbusiness.comwww.imhbusiness.com

ISSN 1986 - 3543PUBLISHED BY IMH

icosia may be the capital of Cyprus and the seaN

T H E F I R S T N A M E I N L O N G - T E R M L O Y A L T Y

M A R I A

We are one of the world’s largest independent providers of trust, fund and corporate administration services.

We are committed to helping our clients protect, nurture and grow their wealth.

Above all, we are a people business.

To find out more about our services and to get to know us better, visit

www.firstnames.com

8 | GOLD | The Business Magazine of Cyprus

SALE OF 2015 EURO COINS The Central Bank of Cyprus (CBC) has announced the sale of Cyprus euro coins minted in 2015. Only

100,000 pieces per denomination have been produced, of which 7,000 pieces have already been used by the CBC in the preparation of equal number of coin sets. The coins on sale are euro circulation coins of all denominations, in uncirculated con-

in rolls and at a nominal amount plus handling (5% on nominal amount), dispatch, insurance charges and

VAT (where applicable).

BANK OF CYPRUS €29 MILLION NET PROFIT IN Q1The Bank of Cyprus Group an-

attributable to the owners for the quarter ending 31 March 2015,

compared to a loss of €337million in the fourth quarter of 2014. On 31 March 2015, gross loans and cus-

tomer deposits totalled €24.1 billion and €13.6 billion respectively, with the L/D ratio improving to 138%,

compared to 141% on 31 December 2014.

G.A.P. VASSILOPOULOS EXPANDS TO BELGIUM

The G.A.P. Vassilopoulos Group is further expanding its reach, having signed a Master Agency agreement to represent Western Union in Bel-gium. The Cyprus-based group is

already responsible for the workings of Western Union – the World-wide leader in International Money trans-fers with a network of over 500,000 points in more than 200 countries

– in Cyprus, the UK, Israel, the Neth-erlands and Luxembourg. G.A.P Vassilopoulos’ business plan for

operations in Belgium provides for the development of a network of 500 associates throughout

the country.

Walking and Talking Peace President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish-Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci took a walk through the divided city

-ers met at 11am at the Ledra Street checkpoint and walked to the occupied north of the old city of Nicosia. President Anastasiades spoke of his common vision with Mustafa Akinci to reunite Cyprus, thereby creating the most stable country in the region. “We know that we have a long way ahead of us. We know that we will

have been open for decades,” he said. Akinci later joked: “It is believed that we Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots are very good at eating and drinking together but when it comes to the negotiating table we are not

Vasilikos Storage Terminal InaugurationPresident Anastasiades inaugurat-ed the storage and management terminal for petroleum products at Vasilikos on Friday 29 May. The facility, was designed and constructed by VTTI. VTTV CEO Rob Nijst said that Cy-prus “has a truly advantageous geographic position to become a regional energy hub. With large refineries being built in the Middle East, the market expects more vessels’ traffic moving oil products through the Suez Canal bound for the Mediterranean markets, and such cargoes will need to be re-sized at a conve-nient oil terminal to meet region-al requirements.” The facility currently comprises of 28 tanks with a capacity of 544,000 cubic meters, and offers access to a deep water marine jetty as well as to road tanker loading facilities.

MONEY

BUSINESSBRIEFING

IN THE NEWS

MOTORINGENERGY

CAR Sales Up Car registrations in the

car registrations recorded an

cinM

toa

MOTORING

onat-

www.goldnews.com.cy | GOLD | 9

RETAIL

IRI Hellas Ltd.

tel: +30 210 4294 404 piraeus@register-iri.com

www.register-iri.com

THE MARSHALL ISLANDSCorporate Registry

The leading jurisdiction for:

Property Holdings

President Inaugurates Park Donated by IronFX Global

P resident Nicos An-astasiades recently inaugurated the Grigoris Afxentiou

Public Park, located adja-cent to the IronFX Global Headquarters in Limassol. Donated by IronFX Global as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility initiative, the park was officially opened by the President, the Mayor of Agios Athanasios, Kyria-kos Hadjittofis, the CEO & Chairman of IronFX Global Markos Kashiouris, and Co-Founder & Board Member Petros Economides. Other dignitaries included the Bishop of Amathus and the Commander of the Na-tional Guard.

FXTM Launches Russian Website

L eading forex bro-kerage firm Forex-Time (FXTM) has announced the

launch of its Russian-lan-guage website. This devel-opment is a result of “high demand” from Russian investors, FXTM repre-sentatives have revealed, and follows the addition of the Thai, Malay and Urdu languages to the site.Having established a glob-al presence in European, Asian and Middle Eastern regions, FXTM has reaf-firmed its commitment to make its website available in as many languages as possible.

FOREX

CYPRIOT COMPANIES WIN EUROPEAN BUSINESS AWARDS

Green Dot Public Co. Ltd and Remedica Ltd were awarded the Ruban D’Honneur at this year’s European Business Awards sponsored by RSM, at a ceremony at London’s Hilton Park Lane Hotel in May. The awards recognize and reward entrepreneur-

ship, good practices and innovation across Europe. About 24,000 companies from 33 countries participated in this year’s competition, surpassing the number of last year’s

The winners for each of the 11 categories of awards were announced at the Ceremony. Two Cypriot companies were

The title is awarded to the ten best companies from all over Europe in each category. Green Dot Public Co Ltd won the Ruban d’Honneur in the Environmental & Corporate Sustainability category, while Remedica Ltd’s award was in the Import/Export category.

BUSINESS

FOREX

TOMMY HILFIGER at Kings Avenue Mall

A new Tommy Hilfiger store has opened at the Kings Avenue Mall in Paphos, making it the third in Cyprus and the latest addition to a growing portfolio of Tommy Hilfiger locations worldwide.

The store is operated by Stazo Trading Ltd.. The Kings Avenue Mall store showcases the latest Spring/Summer 2015 Tommy Hilfiger collec-tions, in a new store design concept that high-lights men’s sportswear, women’s sportswear, and accessories in dedicated areas that celebrate the unique vibe of each category.

10 | GOLD | The Business Magazine of Cyprus

Aphrodite Hills has been honoured by the World Luxury

Spa Awards which recently named it

Best Luxury Resort Spa in Cyprus. The awards are

presented to luxury -

ent categories on a country and global basis. Meanwhile, the Aphrodite Hills Golf & Spa Resort Residences have

received a TripAdvi-

Excellence award.

Qatar

Since 3 June, Qatar Airways has operated a daily

direct service from Larnaca to Doha to help meet demand for both leisure and

business travel.

Doha-Larnaca route will be operated with Airbus A320, featur-ing a two-class con-

up to 12 seats in Business Class and up to 132

seats in Economy Class.

The Classic Hotel, was recently awarded

a 2015 Trip Advisor -

lence and recognised as a Top Performing Hotel for the fourth consecutive year

by the world’s larg-est travel site. The

of Excellence Award recognises establish-ments that consis-

tently earn great Trip Advisor reviews from travellers and achieve

to deliver excellent hospitality services to

customers.

Beaches Cyprus’ beaches have been named the cleanest in Eu-rope for the 10th consecutive year, with a total of 57

local coastal areas receiving Blue Flag

year. In addition, many more beaches

were declared to be excellent swim-ming spots by the

Foundation for Envi-ronmental Education (FEE). After Cyprus

came Greece, Croa-tia, Germany and

Malta.

The number of tour-ist arrivals rose by

quarter of 2015, a further indication of the successful sum-

mer season that industry

experts have pre-dicted. In April 2015

alone there was an 11.3% increase year-on-year, with visitors numbers

reaching 201,495. The data is based on the results of

the Service’s most recent Passenger

Survey.

Licence Three airlines – Co-balt Air, Tous Air and Orion – have applied to the Civil Aviation Department for an

operating licence in Cyprus. Transport

Minister Marios Demetriades has

expressed the hope that, if licensed, the airlines will employ

local personnel, and noted that Cyprus’ connectivity with

destinations in Eu-rope will improve

with the addition of more airlines.

TRAVEL &TOURISMTRAVEL &TOURISM

NEW PRODUCT

BUSINESSBRIEFING

PEOPLE

T he Nicosia-based corporate and trustee ser-vice group, Bi-zserve Consult-

ants, has appointed Antigone

Head of Corporate and Legal

year, specializes in corporate, commercial and European law and she has a broad academic knowledge and practice in banking law. Prior to becoming an associate of

worked for two of the biggest

extensive professional experi-ence. She has been a member of the Cyprus Bar Association since 2011. She received her LLB Law with Honours from the University of Bedfordshire and an LLM in European Law (commercial) from the Univer-sity of Leicester.

KEO Launches Cyprus’ First Light Beer

www.goldnews.com.cy | GOLD | 11

Our local knowledge,your global advantage.

bespoke BVI and Seychelles

companies.

in both the BVI and the Seychelles means that we

T +357 22 767 294E

www.jordanstrustcompany.com

The Cooperative Central Bank has set up a real estate website which will serve as its main portal for information on issues regarding its property

portfolio. The Bank says that the website was created with a view to promoting the sale of property in the Bank`s and the Cooperative Credit Institutions` portfo-lio as well as real estate for which assisted sale is being implemented. The website

currently accommodates 43 properties worth approximately €33 million.A description, photos and other infor-mation about each property is provide on the website, which also provides a search function based on three criteria (district, type of property, target sale price). Properties will be made available through an open bidding procedure and bids must be submitted in writing. Those interested can visit www.ccb.coop.com.cy or www.realestate.coop.com.cy

Real Estate

Central Bank

The ‘Arachnobeea’ project from Cyprus has won the NASA International Space

Apps Challenge in the Best Mission Concept. The proj-ect was the runner-up in the Space Apps Challenge Limas-sol 2015. Arachnobeea, a ‘quadcopter drone’ resembling a spider and a bee and designed to fetch items for astronauts, was selected by a NASA judging committee as one of the six global winners from more than

950 projects from 135 loca-tions worldwide. The Cypriot team won the international competition in the ‘Best Mis-sion Concept’ category.Team Leader Aleksandar Bozic said that they were very proud to be among the top six in the

-egory. He did not rule out the

possibility that NASA might use some parts of the Cypriot project on the International Space Station. The team, which will be invited by NASA to watch the launch of a re-supply ship to the International Space Station in September, is made up of members from Cyprus, Ukraine, Serbia and Armenia.

Cyprus Team Wins NASA Space Apps Challenge

INNOVATION

REAL ESTATE

€798,907