Sokratis Kokkalis

Sokratis Kokkalis (Greek: Σωκράτης Κόκκαλης; 1939) is a Greek businessman, former president and owner of the Piraeus Olympiacos football team.

Biography
Socratis Kokkalis was born in Athens on 27 May 1939. He was the first child of Petros Kokkalis (1896-1962), a prominent physician, and Niki Kouletsi (1913-1997), an academic teacher. He also had a sister, Avgi-Polyxeni (1944-2015). He spent part of his childhood in Fourna, Evritania, where his father was a member of the Political Committee of National Liberation (PEEA) as "Secretary of Social Welfare" and temporarily that of "Education" of the so-called "Government of the Mountain". At the end of the German occupation the family will settle in Athens again, but his parents' participation in the Greek Civil War on the side of the Greek Democratic Army will force them to flee to communist Belgrade, where the children will settle in Bulkeszi to go to school and the father will take part in the Civil War as a member of the Provisional Democratic Government.

The family would be finally reunited in 1949 when they settled in Romania as political refugees. In 1955 the family leaves Romania for East Berlin, where his father is appointed "Director of Experimental Surgery of the Circulatory System" of the German Academy of Sciences. At the end of his secondary education, he will be registered as a student at the Faculty of Physics of the Mikhail Lomonosov State University. Ηe will complete his studies at Humboldt University from which he will receive a degree in physics specializing in telecommunications and electronic technology. Ιn 1963 begins working as an electronic engineer at the Deutscher Fernsehfunk.

Socratis Kokkalis will return to Greece for a while on the occasion of his father's death. The now famous surgeon died on Monday 15 January 1962 and following a request from his wife, which was accepted by the then Prime Minister Konstantinos Karamanlis, his body was buried on 28 January 1962 at the First Cemetery of Athens. During this short period of time he will make his first contacts with Greek entrepreneurs, having already decided to deal with the business part of his academic field.

In 1965 he was able to settle in Greece, after he managed, with the help of the MP of the Centre Union, Athanasios Papageorgiou, to benefit from the favorable regulations for political refugees implemented by the government of Georgios Papandreou and regain Greek citizenship. From this period onwards he started his business activity between East Germany and Greece.

He married twice, the first time in 1969 to Sophia Skouras, daughter of Spyros Skouras, owner of the film company "Skouras Film", and relative of Spyros Skouras. whom they acquired Petros Kokkalis in 1970. In a second marriage he married Eleni Farmaki-Kokkali. They have two sons Konstantinos and Socrates Jr. Socratis Kokkalis Jr. died on 14 July 2018, aged 34, in Cleveland, USA, having consumed cocaine adulterated with heroin and fentanyl.

Business
Kokkalis is the founder and majority shareholder of Intracom Holdings, one of the largest multinational technology groups in Southern Europe, and the chairman and majority shareholder of Intralot S.A., a gaming technology supplier and licensed lottery operator. In 2015 Socrates Kokkalis net worth is estimated to be around US$1.2 billion.

Kokkalis founded Intracom in 1977 as a telecommunication equipment supplier and manufacturer. The company played a leading role in the modernization of telecommunication infrastructure in Greece, especially through a partnership with Ericsson for the manufacturing of digital switches. Intracom expanded in Southeastern Europe and became a leading exporting technology Group, including the areas of software for the public sector, defense electronics and construction. It is listed in the Athens Stock Exchange since 1990.

Kokkalis founded Intralot in 1992, as a hardware and software supplier for the gaming industry. Intralot became one of the three top companies in the sector worldwide, currently with 5,400 employees and presence in 35 countries. Intralot has a strong presence in the United States, with a 20% market share for lotteries, offering its services to 11 State lotteries.

Kokkalis also led Panafon, the mobile venture of Vodafone in Greece, immediately after the launch of mobile telephony in Greece in 1992.

In 2005 Intracom became a Holding company and acquired Hellas Online, an ISP provider which became a major telephony and Internet supplier. Hellas Online was sold to Vodafone in 2014. The same year Intracom Holdings divested also form the telecom manufacturing arm, Intracom Telecom. The Holding today owns three major companies, the construction branch Intrakat, the software developer Intrasoft International, which is an Oracle partner and a major supplier to the European Commission and the European Parliament, and Intracom Defense Electronics, with a strong partnership with Raytheon. The three companies today employ 2,200 people and have presence in 70 countries around the world. Most of the Group revenues come from exports and international activities.

Links with Stazi
According to what has been published over the years, Socrates Kokkalis' first contact with the Stasi was in January 1963 at the initiative of the agency. Kokkalis agrees to cooperate in order to provide various information about his surroundings and about people who might be interested in being recruited by the Stasi. In return, the agency allows him to continue the small-scale smuggling of consumer goods from West to East Berlin. At the time he was reportedly working as a technician for East German television.

After visiting Greece in 1962 on the occasion of his father's funeral, and having met some Greek businessmen, he discussed with the Stasi agent responsible for him the possibility of settling in Greece and contributing to the development of trade relations between the two countries.

The service is positive and in 1965, with the help of the then MP of the Centre Union, Ioannis Papageorgiou, he settles permanently in Greece and develops his contacts with the political circles of the country. In the same year, his contact with the service as an informer was discontinued and by decision of 11 December 1968 his file (code name "Rocco") was closed.

However, again according to what has been published to date, Kokkalis did not break off his relations with Stasi. After the decoding of the HVA digital file, (SIRA), which was done in 1998, Kokkalis reappears in the files under the code names "Kaskade" and "Krokus".

Specifically, in 1982, the first reference is made to "Directorate 3" of the HVA's intelligence sector. In 1985 he is reportedly assigned to the mission to violate the technology embargo on East Germany transferring western know-how through INTRACOM. At this last stage, which lasted at least until 1989, Socrates Kokkalis now bears the code name "Crocus".

Disclosures
In 1996 the parliament of the now reunified Germany set up the, in order to trace and confiscate the money of the SED of former East Germany, even if this money was now in the hands of private individuals.

It is in this context that the financing of INTRACOM (in particular that the start-up capital of INTRAKOM came from the funds of the SED) is investigated  and the link between Socrates Kokkalis and the Stasi is brought to light for the first time. The result of the investigation was negative. The final conclusion of the Commission published on 28 May 1998 states: "In January 1963, Socrates Kokkalis was recruited by the Stasi under the code name Rocco as a GI (secret informant, then known as IM)." But: "The evaluated documents of the MfS contain no evidence that Kokkalis was ultimately actively recruited as an IM or committed himself as such." In addition, it was not possible to definitively clarify whether Integra and Intrakom were to be attributed to the GDR assets. There was no evidence of the participation of the GDR or the SED/PDS in the companies. At the same time, the commission member Friedhelm  Beucher, a member of Bundestag for the SPD, publicly accused the Federal Government of Germany of obstructing the investigation of Kokkalis. The explanation given by  Beucher was that there had apparently been a consultation between Prime Ministers Helmut Kohl and Konstantinos Mitsotakis on the occasion of their joint meeting at the funeral of Willy Brandt in 1992. Kohl, who wanted to be extradited from Greece to Germany, Stasi agent Helmut Voigt, promised not to investigate INTRACOM.

In 2002, the investigative journalist Aristea Bougatsou, journalist of Kathimerini, brought to light documents from the archives of the East German Ministry for State Security in which Socrates Kokkalis seemed to be linked to the service as an informer at first and as a spy afterwards. Stasi documents suggest that the Greek businessman was a Stasi agent, whose operations included delivering Western technological secrets and bribing Greek officials to buy outdated East German telecom equipment.

These allegations led to the intervention of the Public Prosecutor Dimitris Papangelopoulos in February 2002 who brought criminal charges against Socrates Kokkalis for five felonies and two misdemeanours. In 2003, at the conclusion of the pre-trial proceedings, the Prosecutor, with the agreement of the Magistrate, closed the case about espionage, on the grounds that the offence for which they were accused had become statute-barred due to the lapse of fifteen years since their commission. For the remaining offences, the judicial investigation ended in 2007 with an order of the Council of Appeal.

Sports
Kokkalis was owner of Olympiacos BC since the early 1990s. During his presidency the basketball club won five Greek championships, three Greek Cups and one Euroleague in 1997, making the Triple Crown the same year.

He was also for 18 years, until 30 December 2010, owner and chairman of the Greek football club Olympiacos FC. He took the club after the difficult years of the Koskotas scandal and managed to bring it back in success.

During his tenure the club won 12 top division titles, five Greek Cups, and one Greek Super Cup. It was also during his chairmanship that Olympiacos leased from the Greek state for a period of 50 years and reconstructed their homeground Karaiskakis Stadium. It was until that time used by Olympiacos and other Piraeus clubs strictly on a rental basis, and undertook a complete rebuilding of the stadium itself.

Controversies
Kokkalis was criticized by Greek and international media about his activities in Russia, where his company Intralot had sold lottery equipment, technological know-how and software. However, no formal charges were ever filed for any Intralot representative, and the Russian government expressed its trust in Kokkalis and Intralot.

Extensive criticism was also received in the Romanian press by Kokkalis and the companies Intralot and Intracom for allegedly bribing Romanian officials into signing and extending contracts between the Greek firms and the Romanian Lottery that were thoroughly disadvantageous for the Romanian side, with losses totalling up to 1bn Euros as of April 2014.