Get out of Thessaloniki CISCO, thus definitively ending the conflict that recently arose with the Municipality of Thessaloniki regarding the Labattoir building in the Old Slaughterhouses area.
The dispute concerns the operation of Cisco’s DT&S International Center for Digital Transformation and Digital Skills, which, according to the memorandum of cooperation signed by the company with the former municipal authority, is located in the Labattoir building, owned by the Municipality of Thessaloniki, free of charge for four years. The relevant contract expired recently, on June 20.
During the last meeting of the Municipal Council last Monday (July 1), the Mayor of Thessaloniki, Stelios Angeloudisannounced that “the presence of the company that had the use of Labattoir is ending”, accusing the company of not having paid the outstanding debts for electricity and natural gas bills for four years, which were the responsibility of the Municipality and that these were finally paid by the company after pressure from the Municipality.
On this subject, Angeloudis discussed with the former Mayor of Thessaloniki, Konstantinos Zervas, who stressed to the current Mayor that he himself would not like to be the one to drive such a giant out of Thessaloniki, taking the city off the map of innovation and development.
According to press reports, the power supply in the Labattoir building, where Cisco’s DT&S is headquartered, is shared with the adjacent building – the new headquarters of the Association of Greek Industries (SBE).
In a communication from “N” with the management of DT&S, the Director of the International Center for Digital Transformation and DT&S Skills of Cisco in Thessaloniki (ss and Customer Executive for the public sector of Cisco Hellas), Nikos Lambrogeorgos, stated that he preceded by communication between Angeloudis and the General Director of Cisco for Greece, Cyprus, Malta and the Balkans, Antonis Tsiboukis, on Thursday, June 27, during which the Mayor of Thessaloniki informed his intention to use the specific building to house Municipal Services and Cultural Events, two areas for which he would have stated that there were major construction deficiencies in the Municipality.
Debt payment
Regarding the disputed accounts, the company claims that on the one hand the debts have been paid, on the other hand that there was a purely technical problem in the calculation of the debts between Cisco and SBE, while on the crucial question of what the next day of Cisco’s visit to Thessaloniki will be like and whether DT&S will operate elsewhere in the city, the answer was that DT&S’s operating cycle in Thessaloniki will stop and the company will no longer have a presence in the city, as well as that it is particularly proud of the project it has implemented in the four years of DT&S’s operation in the city.
“We are completely satisfied with our work. We have added value to both the economy and the cultural activity of the region,” stresses Lambrogeorgos, adding that this offer has been confirmed in these four years by politicians and companies not only from Greece. In these four years, DT&S, according to its management, has welcomed more than 17,000 visitors from 20 countries, hosted 302 international conferences, implemented 27 cycles of training programmes with 400 beneficiaries, welcomed 2,000 students and teachers from 31 schools and implemented 20 innovative projects in many areas of daily life.
It is important to note that DT&S is not a hub, like the highly equipped centers of other foreign multinationals in Thessaloniki, such as Pfizer, but is essentially a training center for digital skills, which is why its staff is in the single digits and, at the same time, the Center has maintained collaborations. However, it was the most discussed and “famous” of the placements of foreign multinationals in Thessaloniki, which was presented by the country’s political leadership as a vote of confidence from the US in the country and in Thessaloniki, and regardless of the size of the investment, included Thessaloniki in 2020 on the map of “smart” cities on the planet.
In any case, the cessation of Cisco’s DT&S operation in Thessaloniki does not affect the rest of the American multinational’s presence in Greece, as it has offices and a hub, which employs around 200 people, in Marousi, while it has also acquired the Cretan start-up BGP company.