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CIONET - What's next

Connecting ambitious digital leaders and businesses around the globe.

Catch up on the upcoming CIONET Events

             
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Germany Sep 9, 2025 Country Members Physical german

Frankfurt: AI Driven Logistics

Vom ersten Use Case zur strategischen Neuausrichtung CIONET lädt bereits zum vierten Mal zu einem exklusiven Roundtable für CIOs und Digitalverantwortliche aus Logistik und Handel ein. Im Mittelpunkt des Abends steht die Frage, wie Unternehmen ihre KI-Initiativen erfolgreich skalieren und aus ersten Use Cases echten strategischen Mehrwert schaffen. Microsoft 365 für Frontline Worker: Moderne Tools, die Mitarbeitende im Tagesgeschäft entlasten ServiceNow für Prozessintegration: Automatisierte End-to-End-Workflows – vom Schadensfall bis zur Retourenabwicklung KI-gestützte Disposition und Planung: Mit smarten Algorithmen zur optimierten Supply Chain Digitale Lieferketten und letzte Meile: Transparenz, Effizienz und Kundenzentrierung durchgängig gedacht

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Belgium Sep 13, 2025 All Members Physical english

CIONET Cycling Event

Join us for a wonderful ride. The ride is accessible to all levels of riders and doesn't require extensive technical skills. More information will follow soon. Looking forward to ride together!

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Germany Sep 17, 2025 Country Members Physical german

München: Cyber Security Fatigue

Cybersecurity ist längst kein reines IT-Thema mehr – sie betrifft das gesamte Unternehmen. Doch während die Bedrohungslage zunimmt, geraten viele Security-Verantwortliche an ihre Belastungsgrenzen: zwischen 24/7-Verantwortung, wachsenden Anforderungen und dem ständigen Innovationsdruck.

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Germany Sep 17, 2025 Country Members Physical german

Köln: CIO & CISO, das Rezilienz-Power-Duo

IT-Betrieb und Cybersicherheit stehen heute unter extremem Druck: steigende Komplexität, wachsende regulatorische Anforderungen (NIS2, DORA, KRITIS), chronische Ressourcenknappheit – und gleichzeitig eine Bedrohungslage, die keine Verzögerungen duldet. Trotzdem agieren viele IT- und Security-Teams noch immer in Silos. Die Folge: ineffiziente Abläufe, Tool-Wildwuchs, langsame Reaktion auf Vorfälle und unklare Verantwortlichkeiten.

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Germany Sep 18, 2025 Country Members Virtual german

Online: Nachhaltige IT - CIDO Priorität

Nachhaltigkeit ist für CIOs nicht nur ein „Nice-to-have“, sondern eine strategische Priorität – sie beeinflusst direkt die finanzielle Performance, die operative Effizienz und die langfristige Wettbewerbsfähigkeit.

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Belgium Sep 18, 2025 Country Members Physical french

Les Rencontres: La dette technique : Un défi stratégique pour les entreprises

La dette technique est comparable à la négligence des réparations d'une maison. Ignorer un toit qui fuit peut faire gagner du temps aujourd'hui, mais cela pourrait conduire à l'effondrement du plafond plus tard. Pour remédier à la dette technique, il faut trouver et réparer ces fuites dès maintenant et mettre en place un plan d'entretien de la maison afin qu'elle soit prête pour les extensions futures. Pour résoudre ces problèmes, il faut définir des priorités stratégiques, communiquer clairement avec les parties prenantes et établir une feuille de route à long terme pour la modernisation. Cet événement se déroulera entièrement en français.

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Recent Cases

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Georgia Ministry improves experience for users and IT staff alike

This case study examines how the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia partnered with Orient Logic to support remote learning. By redesigning its IT landscape using Red Hat® OpenShift® and Red Hat Application Foundations, the Ministry improved the user's experience, reduced outages, and accelerated software releases.

In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia
(the Ministry) realized that it needed to adapt its software so it could offer students remote
learning. Its Education Management Information System (EMIS) was the core system that
needed to change. IT partner Orient Logic worked with the Ministry’s EMIS IT department to
redesign the Ministry’s IT landscape based on Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Application
Foundations (formerly Red Hat Integration). As a result, the Ministry not only supported remote
learning but also improved the student and teacher experience, reducing outages by 99% and
accelerating software releases from once every few months to daily. The new IT environment
also improved the work life of its IT staff

 

Adapting to the new reality of remote learning
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, schools and universities around the world faced an unexpected
and unplanned crisis that demanded rapid change. Many educational institutes struggled to adapt
their lessons and teaching resources to constantly changing circumstances and implement distance
learning at very short notice.
The Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia was no exception. It became apparent that its
software was not designed for remote learning. The Ministry has a highly centralized education
system, with all public schools falling under the Ministry of Education. The software used for
assignments, grades, schedules, and so on—the Education Management Information System (EMIS)—
had 600,000 users, with around 15,000 to 20,000 logged in simultaneously on any given day.
EMIS had struggled to cope with peak loads even before the pandemic demanded distance learning.
First-grade registration caused a major surge each year. “There is 1 day a year when the whole
country tries to register their first graders,” said David Tatishvili, Deputy Head of EMIS at the Ministry
of Education and Science of Georgia. “Capacity had to be planned for the maximum number of
simultaneous users, up to 100,000. It meant we had a huge infrastructure just to accommodate that
one day.”
With systems monolithic and tightly coupled, data integration between systems took place
via database synchronization procedures every night, and all systems had to be stopped until
synchronization was complete. “At least once or twice a month, there was a sync error, which meant
the IT team had to work overnight to fix it to prevent system outage or data corruption,” said Merab
Gogolauri, Software Development and Cloud Infrastructure Director at the Ministry’s preferred IT
partner, Orient Logic.
Parents would give negative feedback if the system went down. “It was impossible to introduce rapid
changes without breaking something,” said Tatishvili. “That would lead to angry users storming EMIS
communication and social media channels throughout Georgia.”


Adopting a microservices approach
Needing a way to rapidly adapt its existing systems to the new reality, the Ministry turned to Orient
Logic. “We had to rapidly change and adapt the EMIS as the Ministry switched to distance learning
through Microsoft Teams,” said Gogolauri. “Agile software development and agile infrastructure
would help the Ministry reduce problems and resolve integration concerns.”
Orient Logic worked with the EMIS IT team to redesign the Ministry of Education’s IT landscape
based on Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Application Foundations (formerly Red Hat Integration).
The aim was to move toward a new system based on microservices, which would be more modern
and more agile, and could be rapidly developed and expanded.
Red Hat OpenShift operates as a central data integration hub for all applications. This cloud-native
application platform runs on the Ministry’s own cloud environment. Red Hat Application Foundations
provides data exchange, API management, and security for integration with external entities.
“EMIS used to have a lot of manual deployment, but now it’s all automatic,” said Gogolauri.
“Some systems are integrated directly through APIs.”

 

Improving user experience by reducing outages

Reduced system outages by 99%
Major upgrades in EMIS have significantly improved stability and, with that, user experience for teachers,
parents, and students in Georgia. Bugs no longer break the system and synchronization,
which was problematic before, now works flawlessly.
“We have not had major problems—even once—since deploying Red Hat Application Foundations to
replace our legacy data synchronization,” said Tatishvili.
Although Georgia has returned to offline learning in a classroom setting, distance learning could
easily be accommodated again if needed without causing the issues and, therefore, the downtime
seen during COVID. “The system is more robust now,” said Gogolauri.

 

Improved experience for IT staff
The modernizations and improvements are much appreciated by IT staff who no longer need to work
nights on quick fixes. The container separation found in Red Hat OpenShift has been particularly
welcome, as have the new rollback capabilities.
“We provided EMIS with a future-ready, technically superior solution based on Red Hat OpenShift,
where even if one system fails, it does not impact other systems at all,” said Gogolauri. “Any change
to any system is quick and easy. And if there is a problem, it is very local and EMIS can be rolled back
to the previous stable version with 1 click.”


Accelerated software releases daily
Implementing new development approaches and tools enabled by Red Hat OpenShift, including CI/CD
and GitOps, means software releases are significantly more efficient and frequent now. It used to take
several hours to manually deploy them and, as a result, it was only practical to deliver large numbers of
them once every few months.
“Implementing CI/CD and GitOps has streamlined the software development process,” said Gogolauri.
“We write it, Red Hat OpenShift deploys it, and no engineering assistance is needed. We can deploy
new software in small increments several times a day, accelerating software development projects.”


Building on pandemic success by revising legacy core systems
From the perspective of the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, the new environment is a vast
improvement. The EMIS team has not been shy about recommending the rollout of Red Hat technologies
to other parts of the government. “The EMIS team has been telling people how happy they are with the
results,” said Tatishvili. “Informal user feedback from teachers and parents has also been very positive.”
Orient Logic is proud and happy to have helped the Ministry: “Synchronization was our headache, too;
we also helped them to be a lot more successful. All these changes led to a significant increase in
user satisfaction as there are no application outages anymore. They can also add new functionality to
applications on a daily basis,” said Gogolauri.
The next step is for EMIS to revise its old core systems, rewriting everything as microservices, and
implementing new features and software. “We have achieved ongoing development,” said Gogolauri.
“Our Red Hat technologies are based on leading open-source projects and provide unmatchedcapabilities to integrate any systems EMIS might require in future.” 

 

About the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia
The Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia aims to establish a modern and innovative
educational environment in close cooperation with civil society, providing lifelong learning and equal
access to quality education, in order to prepare each individual for future life and promote employment,
personal and professional development. In 2012, the Education Management Information System
(EMIS) was founded. By developing advanced information and communication technologies and an
electronic education management system, EMIS aims to further support the education sector

Checkout our CIONET COOKBOOK

cookbook

Embark on a culinary journey through the ever-evolving world of digital leadership with our third edition of the CIONET Cookbook: Recipes for Digital Success. Unveiling the intricate trilemma faced by today’s Master Chefs, our trailblazing European CIOs address a challenge at the nexus of customer interests, digital transformation strategies, and IT modernisation. Their secret? Synchronising the gearing between customer, business, and technology to create a frictionless movement through the digital landscape.

The CIONET Cookbook uses the analogy of a five-star restaurant to explain the importance of optimally integrated technology, with the CIO as Master Chef. In order to provide the best service to its customers, a top restaurant must have the right atmosphere, an inviting menu, a well-equipped kitchen, talented and committed front-of-house and kitchen staff and smooth-running processes that ensure an enjoyable experience for diners.

CIONET TV

 
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Sharon Prior - CIO in transition - How Great Tech Leadership Begins with Business Thinking

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José Antonio López, Group CIO at TOUS - Jewels, Data & AI: Inside the Digital Transformation of TOUS

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Tom Tanghe - General Manager ITC EMEA at Daikin Europe - Reinventing the CIO Role

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CIOFEST 2025 - From Order Taker to Proactive Disruptor

CIONET Reports

 
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Cybersecurity in critical infrastructure

Geopolitical tensions have dominated the headlines for over two years now. In this context, the cyber threat landscape is also evolving rapidly. The protection and security of critical infrastructure – both physical and digital – is becoming increasingly important.

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HDS - From Hype to Reality Navigating the Challenges of GenAI

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Integration In An Era Of AI: Challenges And Opportunities

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“The CIONET app provides a really cool platform to network and share insights.”

About CIONET

CIONET’s mission is to help IT executives become more at ease and above all more successful in their jobs. So they can do more than just keep up with change but ultimately define it. CIONET opens up a whole new universe of opportunities in IT management.

With the largest membership of corporate digital leaders across Europe, Latin America, US and Australia, CIONET has the expertise and pioneering vision to solve or address any IT management challenge.

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From our local and global events, from our publications and research to our executive education programmes, everything we do is aimed at making sure digital leaders maximise their potential.

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