Karel de Vriendt
European Commission
General Director of Informatics
Karel De Vriendt is a Dutch speaking Belgian who holds a nuclear engineering degree and post-graduate degrees in IT and Public Management. After having worked for seven years as a software engineer and project manager in a large multinational telecommunications company, he started to work for the Commission in what is now the Information Society and Media directorate-general, following-up research projects related to software engineering. Thereafter, he worked for fifteen years in the Commission‘s internal IT service, managing projects and teams working on electronic mail, networking and telecommunications, user support and application development. Since mid 2005, he is responsible, in the Enterprise and Industry DG, for the pan-European eGovernment services unit. This unit is responsible for the IDABC programme that has as its objective to “identify, support and promote the development and establishment of pan-European eGovernment services and the underlying infrastructure supporting the Member States and the Community in the implementation, within their respective areas of competence, of Community policies and activities, achieving substantial benefits for public administrations, businesses and citizens”.
