The University of Piraeus was founded in 1938 and today runs ten departments in the general fields of Economics & Business Administration, Finance, Maritime, and Information & Communication Technologies, awarding degrees and doctorates in the corresponding scientific fields. The University of Piraeus Research Center (UPRC) was established in 1983 as a non-profit research organisation, providing the institutional framework which would facilitate the research carried out by Faculty members.
The Department of Economics offers both undergraduate and graduate programs and provides an excellent research environment that pushes forward the frontier of knowledge in various fields. In this context, the Department of Economics has been actively involved and coordinated a significant number of projects funded by the European Union, the General Secretariat of Research and Technology, organizations of the civil and the private sector, as well as non-profit and non-governmental organizations.
The Laboratory of Local and Regional Development (LoReD) belongs to the Department of Economics and specializes in a wide range of research areas such as innovation clusters, local markets or custom-made services (i.e. insurance market). Using up-to-date statistical, economic and micro-econometric methods, the laboratory is active in consulting of companies and local governments. A number of business reports is produced to study economic and financial indicators.
All the members of the Laboratory of Local and Regional Development (LoReD) excess strong academic and research activities. They published in top academic journals, whereas they continuously attend international conferences and workshops. Therefore, the research team does have the necessary know-how to effectively carry out and complete the RARE project by contributing to the following axes:
- Road transport and vehicle insurance market analysis
- Design and development of end-user incentive schemes
- Implementation of a pilot operation of the application
- Study of the economic, social and environmental effects of the research project
Core team members:
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Markos Tselekounis (Assistant Professor, University of Piraeus): He serves as the Scientific Director of the RARE project and is in charge for the overall scientific supervision of the project activities and the promotion of high quality results.
He holds a PhD in Regulatory Economics, an MSc in Telecommunications Economics and a BSc in Economics. His main research interests are in industrial economics, microeconomic theory, network economics and sustainable development. He has been participating in several European and national projects in the areas of sustainable driving and network economics. -
Sotiris Karkalakos, (Professor, Department of Economics, University of Piraeus): He is the Director of the Laboratory of Local and Regional Development, thus he has coordinated and participated in several research funding projects. He serves as the Coordinator of the RARE project and is in charge for the overall coordination of the project.
He holds a BA in Economics from the University of Piraeus, a Master's Degree (MSc) in Finance from Florida Atlantic University and a PhD in Applied Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His research activity focuses on regional development, corporate tax competition, microeconomics and spatial analysis. -
Sofia Xesfingi (Post-Doc Researcher, Department of Economics, University of Piraeus || Lecturer, Hellenic Open University): Sofia serves as a Research Associate in the RARE project with a particular focus on studying the impact of the safe driving behavior on health care expenses.
She holds a PhD in Applied Economics, a MSc in Healthcare Management and a BA in Biology. She has taught health economics, tourism economics and entrepreneurship both at undergraduate and postgraduate level. Her research interests lie in the fields of Health, Migration, and Tourism. Her publication record includes top tier journals, and her research has been financed from a number of prestigious national and European grants. -
Charalambos (Harris) Agyropoulos (Lecturer, Department of Economics, University of Piraeus || Postgraduate researcher, Department of International and European Studies, University of Piraeus)He serves as a Research Associate in the RARE project. He is responsible for shaping the incentive mechanisms for the use of the total output of the project, as well as for evaluating its environmental effects.
He holds a PhD in Economics, a Master's Degree in Applied Statistics from the University of Piraeus and a BA in Mathematics from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. His research interests focus on the fields of Applied Econometrics, Financial Analysis, Labor and Tourism Economic. His work has been published in international scientific journals and financed from European and national funds. His current research includes machine learning techniques.
