– UK, London – Upstream, leading mobile technology company, is strengthening its international management team with two key appointments. Kostas Kastanis assumes the role of Deputy CEO following his leadership of Upstream’s pioneering ad-funded mobile internet platform, Zero-D, which now has an addressable market of some 250 million people.
Meanwhile, Chrysa Karamanidi moves from her position as head of the company’s One-D platform to assume the role of Chief Innovation Officer.
Upstream CEO Dimitris Maniatis said: “These two appointments further strengthen our leadership team and will help sharpen our strategic focus as we continue to expand our global business. During the past three years, we have worked hard to transform our product portfolio and bring it to market. The early success of our new offerings has given us full confidence to move forward with our strategy. We believe that by continually improving our performance and enhancing the innovation we can bring to the mobile marketplace, Upstream is becoming the go-to digital monetization partner for the mobile operator community across emerging markets.”
As Deputy CEO, Kostas Kastanis will support in the execution of the company’s strategic direction to grow Upstream as the mobile operator partner that drives their digital growth maintaining direction over product and strategy.
“Upstream is playing a vital role both for mobile operators and their subscribers,” Kastanis said. “In an increasingly digital world, mobile operators find themselves competing in a new environment, with new, digitally-native, players. Upstream supports mobile operators’ digital transformation by unlocking new revenue streams, key for their future growth. Our offerings are fully customer-centred and ensure seamless customer experience, increase engagement and address the needs of connectivity thirsty users in emerging markets”.
About Chrysa Karamanidi
As Chief Innovation Officer, Chrysa Karamanidi will drive the performance of the company’s solutions and lead the evolution of the Upstream product roadmap in close co-operation with Kastanis.
“Developing new digital revenue streams is a key priority for the operator community,” Karamanidi explained. “Our expertise has been to design and launch products that help operators achieve their goals and improve the services they offer to their customers. Our track record to date is proof we can deliver innovation and excellence right across our product portfolio.”
After joining Upstream in 2009 Chrysa Karamanidi held a number of roles within the company’s campaigns and digital marketing operations before becoming General Manager for LATAM markets. In 2018 she took over the leadership of the company’s One-D Digital Marketing solution and led the development and launch of new mobile operator products.
Chrysa is a graduate in Management Science and Technology from Athens University, while also holds a Master’s Degree in Marketing from Bath University in the UK.
About Kostas Kastanis
Kostas Kastanis joined Upstream in 2015 initially as Head of Strategy before taking on the leadership of Zero-D platform. Prior to joining Upstream Kastanis worked with global consulting firm McKinsey & Company and also with Mastercard.
He is a graduate of the Athens University of Economics & Business in Operations Research and holds a Master of Science degree in Decision Sciences from the same university as well as an MBA from INSEAD.
About Upstream
Upstream, the leading mobile technology company, provides innovative solutions that offer seamless and secure mobile Internet access to 1.2 billion consumers in high growth markets. Upstream’s Zero-D platform enables mobile operators to increase digital engagement, ARPU and create new mobile advertising revenues. Its award-winning security platform, Secure-D, in 2019 alone, processed over 1.7 billion mobile transactions, detecting and blocking over 98,000 malicious apps in 20 countries. With a presence in over 45 countries in Latin America, Africa, and SE Asia, Upstream works with more than 60 mobile operators.
For more information: https://www.upstreamsystems.com
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