ABOUT US

Christos Makiyama

Christos is the President of Silicon Planet, a venture development firm he founded in February 2001. Silicon Planet's scope is to work with technology innovators and support to identify and evaluate market opportunities and develop a sustainable and high-value business model around their technologies.

During the last 20 years, Christos has engaged and supported the venture development initiatives of various corporations such as NTT, Oki Electric, Paltek, ImageOne as well many technology startups with innovative technologies in the areas of networking and, communication, semiconductors, video communications, computer vision, IoT and AI.

In 2004, he joined Helic, a startup company that had developed innovative electromagnetic analysis solutions and IP for wireless and high-speed communication ICs design. Christos led the company's Japanese market development activities and, until February 2019, had closed many high-value business deals with companies in semiconductors design, such as SONY, Fujitsu, Toshiba, Panasonic, SHARP, AKM, Samsung, Denso, and many others. In 2008, Christos also helped to secure a strategic investment from Fujitsu and Magma Design. Ansys, the world market leader in engineering simulation solutions, acquired Helic in February 2019.

Christos had been an angel investor and Director of the Board of Think Silicon, based in Patra, Greece. Christos's journey with the company started in late 2014. He was actively involved in various aspects of the strategy and business development for its innovative ultra-low power GPU and Display controller technology. Applied Materials, the world leader in semiconductor and display engineering solutions, acquired Think Silicon in April 2020.

Christos has co-founded Loctio, which has developed an innovative positioning technology and architecture for IoT devices. And he is an advisor of various emerging technology ventures, such as Fieldscale, InAccel, IridaLabs and others.

He is a mentor with Reload Greece, a UK-based non-profit organization which aims to educate and support young entrepreneurs.