George Palikaras

Dr. Palikaras is the founding President & CEO of Meta Materials Inc. (META®), specializing in smart materials and nanotechnology with the vision to bring the benefits of metamaterials and nanotechnology to the world. Over the past years he has forged alliances with Fortune 500 companies, enabling META to co-develop and lead disruptive technologies and commercialize first in class solutions with industry partners.

Under George’s leadership, META has raised more than US$250 million in financing and completed nine M&A transactions, including complex cross border deals, to advance the business. It has grown its patent portfolio to over 450 (active and pending) patents, spanning from optics to batteries, from medical applications to solar, from automotive to aerospace applications. His passion for technology has resulted in being listed as inventor in over 40 patents, and an author in 50 scientific publications globally. META is the first company to cost-effectively scale the manufacturing of metamaterials and optical films, and in 2021, it became the first metamaterials company listed on the NASDAQ.

Following his post-doctoral research in wearable and implantable sensors at Queen Mary University in London, and prior to founding META, he watched a close family member struggle with serious illness and George recognized the potential metamaterials could play in healthcare, and in particular, in providing earlier and more accurate diagnoses to patients. George founded Medical Wireless Sensing Ltd. (MediWise) a research and development MedTech company based in London, UK, with the vision to improve healthcare by enabling high precision non-invasive diagnostics. MediWise received several awards including the Winner of the 4th Edition “Building Global Innovator” competition by MIT.

Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, he worked as a researcher at Queen Mary University in London. He also worked in industry at Wireless Technology Laboratories (formerly Nortel Networks). Dr. Palikaras has a BEng. in Computer Engineering, an MSc. in Digital Communication Systems and did his PhD studies in Material Science. He has received executive education at Stanford, Harvard, UCL and INSEAD business schools.

George resides with his wife and son in Nova Scotia, Canada and has earned widespread recognition for his achievements, including being named a “40 Under 40” entrepreneur by Fortune Greece, an “Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year” by Ernst and Young, Canada and an “Endeavor Entrepreneur” by Endeavor Global, Inc.

Follow George on twitter at @palikaras