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As chairman, president and CEO of MICROS Systems, Inc., A.L. (Tom) Giannopoulos has had a profound impact on the hospitality industry. For his leadership in expanding MICROS into one of the leading software companies in the hospitality industry, Hospitality Financial and Technology Professionals (HFTP) inducts Giannopoulos into the International Hospitality Technology Hall of Fame. Also inducted this year is Cindy Estis Green, managing partner of The Estis Group. The inductions take place at the 2009 Hospitality Industry Technology Exposition and Conference (HITEC) General Session on Tuesday, June 23 at 8:30 a.m.
“I am extremely honored, excited, and humbled to be induction into the International Hospitality Technology Hall of Fame,” stated Giannopoulos. “The hospitality industry has given me the unique opportunity to collaborate with some very talented, insightful and innovative people. It has been a true pleasure. I share this honor with all MICROS employees worldwide whose hard work has contributed to this induction."
During his 18 years with MICROS, he has led the company from $35 million in revenue with products servicing only the restaurant industry to a $954 million company that is a leading provider of enterprise applications for restaurants, hotels, casinos, motels, leisure and entertainment and retail operations. When Giannopoulos first started with MICROS, it was a subsidiary of Westinghouse Electric Corp, where he worked for over 25 years. When Westinghouse divested of its ownership of MICROS, Giannopoulos left Westinghouse to lead MICROS from a small cash register company into a company that provides enterprise applications for the hospitality and retail industries worldwide.
Over 310,000 MICROS systems are currently installed in hospitality and retail operations in more than 130 countries, and on all seven continents. In addition, MICROS provides property management systems, central reservation and customer information solutions under the brand MICROS-Fidelio for more than 25,000 hotels worldwide.
In 2000, MICROS’ OPERA software revolutionized the industry by providing operators the ability to share information across multiple applications and properties on a single database while providing the necessary enterprise software solutions and tools for Property and Central operations. Today, OPERA is one of the industry’s most comprehensive software for property management and core central systems.
In the past several years, Giannopoulos has spearheaded the launch of myfidelio.net, an e-commerce solution for the hospitality industry, as well as Simphony, MICROS’s first software as a service offering that is an enterprise, service-oriented architecture (SOA,), point-of-sale (POS), hospitality product. Giannopoulos is also an avid supporter of hospitality programs, and has donated the OPERA and MICROS POS software to many key colleges and universities for education purposes.
The International Hospitality Technology Hall of Fame is HFTP’s highest level of recognition in the area of technology. Since its inception in 1989, 29 individuals have received this award as a reflection of their contributions to the hospitality industry. Hall of Fame members have been selected by their peers as representing the best in innovation and application and as leaders in their profession.
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