*********************************
There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
*********************************
Atlanta, GA | Posted: March 11, 2020
Denise Ward
Institute Communications
Summary Sentence:
Newly created position provides vision and strategic leadership for all data management activities and is responsible for global data management, utilization, security, governance, and privacy across the Institute.
Full Summary:
Newly created position provides vision and strategic leadership for all data management activities and is responsible for global data management, utilization, security, governance, and privacy across the Institute.
Didier ContisDidier Contis, director of Technology Services for the College of Engineering (CoE), has been named interim associate vice president for Data Strategy and Analytics, effective March 1. He will be reporting to Raheem Beyah in his temporary role that reports to the president. Contis’ position provides vision and strategic leadership for all data management activities and is responsible for global data management, utilization, security, governance, and privacy across the Institute.
“Didier is a creative problem solver with decades of experience and leadership in technology services,” said Beyah, Motorola Foundation Professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and vice president for Interdisciplinary Research at Georgia Tech. “His proven track record of partnering across campus makes him ideal for this role. He has been critical to our initial data security efforts over the last few months, and I look forward to him leading the Institute’s efforts around data strategy.”
The creation of this position is part of the Institute’s commitment to treat its data as a global strategic asset — not only protected but also fully leveraged in support of Georgia Tech’s mission and strategic goals. Work will take place in the coming weeks to build the structure of the unit that will support these strategic efforts. This appointment also follows the recommendation from outside experts who were engaged to accelerate the Institute’s data governance processes.
Contis began his career at Georgia Tech in 1999 as a research engineer for the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Before that, he was a network security engineer in the banking industry. He was the IT manager for Tech’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering from 2004 to 2007 before becoming the first director of Technology Services for the College of Engineering.
In that role, Contis established several partnerships with the Office of Information Technology and other academic units to develop new campuswide services in support of research and instruction, with a strong focus on empowering users. Some of the projects he spearheaded include providing students with just-in-time access to use graphics-intensive engineering applications using the ATAWAD model (AnyTime, AnyWhere, Any Devices); services to protect and archive data; improving the CoE portfolio of engineering software accessible to students and researchers; and a distributed private academic cloud in partnership with the Georgia Tech High Performance Computing group and the College of Computing to support specific research and instructional workloads. Throughout his career he has been active in the fields of research cyber-infrastructure and information security. He also has been actively working with Georgia Tech Cyber Security on data security and data safeguards.
“Over the past 20 years, I have witnessed firsthand the data growth explosion across all aspects of the Institute,” Contis said. “Data has truly become a global strategic asset without which Georgia Tech could not fulfill its mission, especially at a time where the digitization of the world and our everyday life is accelerating. As both an alumnus and a proud Georgia Tech parent, in partnership with other groups such as the Office of Information Technology or Enterprise Data Management, I plan to work diligently to ensure we keep these assets protected. These assets include some of our most sensitive data, such as student data. Concurrently, I also firmly believe that the Institute should be able to fully leverage its data assets to the benefit of our constituents, as well as to support the Institute's mission and new strategic initiatives. To that end, I look forward to working closely with groups already engaged in many aspects of the Institute’s complex data ecosystem.”
Contis holds a Master of Science in electrical engineering from Georgia Tech and a Diplôme d'Ingénieur (Bachelor) from the Ecole des Mines de Nantes-France.
