Gratian MihailescuUrban Innovation Expert

- Urban Development
- Sustainability
- Smart Cities
- EU Cohesion Policy
- Multi-level governance
- Innovation
- MA, Joint Degree in Comparative Local Development, European Master
- Postgraduate Program, Project Management and Community Advisor, Free University of Brussels
- MA, International Relations and European Studies, Eberhard Karl University, West University of Timișoara
- BA, Communication and Public Relations, West University of Timișoara
After 3 years spent in Brussels as a consultant in European Affairs, Gratian returned to Romania and started working as an external expert with consulting companies and notable think-tanks like Advocacy Academy, Alliance for Clean Romania, Europuls, Assembly of European Regions, Freedom House, GEA Strategy Consulting, The Institute of Popular Studies. In 2013 he established the Local Development Institute to support local and regional development and in 2016 he launched Urbanize Hub, a global start-up and a community of experts who would shape the future cities in a smart and sustainable way. He is also a social innovator in the EduCab project, an institutional capacity building mechanism, aiming to catalyze the educational and local development opportunities within communities, a project developed in Romania, Senegal, Nepal, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia. Since 2015, Gratian is a PhD researcher and lecturer at the West University of Timișoara, teaching EU policies and doing research about importance of the subsidiarity principle.