Born in Thessaloniki, Greece in 1945, Prof. Metakides received as a Fulbright scholar a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering and Doctor of Philosophy in Mathematical Logic from Cornell University in 1971. He pursued an academic career in the U.S.A. at MIT, Cornell University and Rochester University until 1978, when he returned to Greece to take the Chair of Logic at the University of Patras. He has published numerous articles and books in the areas of Mathematical Logic, Computer Science and Science Policy and is a frequent invited speaker at major international conferences. He holds honorary doctorates from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, the Technical University of Bucharest and the University of Thessaloniki and is an honorary professor of the University of Moscow. He is a foreign member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences and an honorary member of the Romanian Academy of Science. He has received the Medal of Honour of the Bulgarian Academy of Science, the Polish Information Society Recognition Award, for his efforts to build co-operation between IT professionals in Poland and the EU, and the Telecom Europe Prize Salvà I Campillo for his contribution to the development and dissemination of new information and communication technologies in Europe.

Since 1984 he has held senior positions with responsibility for R&D policy, funding and international co-operation in European institutions, including president of the Research Group of the European Council and member of the ESPRIT (European Strategic Programme of Research in Information Technology) Management Committee and of the NATO Science Committee at different times between 1984 and 1987. He established and headed the department for Basic Research and International Scientific Relations in Information Technologies at the European Commission from 1988 to 1993. He was the director of the 2 billion Euro ESPRIT Programme in the European Commission’s Industry Directorate General from 1993 until its completion in 1998.

Until November 2002 he was director of Essential Technologies and Infrastructures in Europe’s 4 billion Euro Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme (1998-2002), in the Information Society Directorate General which – besides funding and co-ordinating R&D in information and communication technologies in the European Union – also covers information society and telecommunications policy and regulation. He is an active contributor to the promotion of co-operation between the European Union and other regions. He has instigated the establishment of research agreements between the EU and the USA (including the launch of the World Wide Web Consortium, W3C, and a joint initiative on the dependability of critical infrastructures). In addition to collaborative activities with Japan, China, Russia and the countries of Latin America, he leads a number of joint actions in Central & Eastern Europe as well as the Balkan and Mediterranean regions.