Miklós Havass

In the first period of the development of Hungarian IT, he worked as a programmer, software developer, company manager, and one of the organizers of Hungarian IT public life.

He began his career at the Institute for Organization and Administrative Automation of the Ministry of Finance (PM SZÜI) in Budapest. He prepared the purchase of a computer and then performed programming work.

In 1965, he transferred to the Institute of Industrial Economics and Plant Management (NIM IGÜSZI) of the Ministry of Heavy Industry, where they acquired Hungary's first Western-made transistor computer, the National-Elliott 803 Bt. Here he worked on operations research, non-numerical and basic software development tasks (for the EMG 830 machine).

From 1972, he worked on operating systems and software technology tasks for VIDEOTON computers at the Infelor Systems Technology Company, and together with his colleagues he organized the launch of Hungarian software exports.

From 1982, he was the president and CEO of the Computer Application Company (Számalk), which was established as the legal successor of Infelor. In 1995, he and his colleagues privatized the company based on the guidelines of the State Property Agency. Under his presidency, Számalk established the IBS (International Business School of Budapest) and GDF (Gábor Dénes College) higher education schools, the META and Számalk Vocational High Schools, the OBS (Open Business School) distance learning business training center, and the ISB (International School of Budapest) foreign language primary and secondary school. He was the initiator of the introduction and foundation of domestic distance learning.

He was one of the founding members of the John Neumann Computer Science Society (NJSZT), of which he was Secretary General between 1985 and 1989, President between 1990 and 1994, and Honorary President from 2001. He was a member of the plenum of the National Technical Development Committee (OMFB). He was President of the Association of Technical and Natural Science Associations (MTESZ) and the Hungarian Geoinformatics Society (HUNAGI). In 1994, he was elected a member of the Hungarian Academy of Engineers (MMA). He was Vice President of the Association of Hungarian Talent Development Associations and Co-President of the Bolyai Workshop Foundation. In 1995, he was one of the initiators and organizers of the development of the National Informatics Strategy. He was a member of the National Information and Communications and Informatics Council (NHIT), an advisory body to the government, for several terms. He participates in the work of the Informatics History Forum (iTF).

He gives an exhaustive account of his life and principles in his report book Ifjan – Éretten – Éltesen, in which he also gives an account of his literary work and awards.

His most significant awards: Neumann Prize (NJSZT, 1978); Fényes Elek Memorial Medal (Central Statistical Office, KSH, 1990); MTESZ Prize (1994); Lipót Aschner Prize - Manager of the Year Award (National Association of Industrialists, 1997); Dénes Gábor Prize (Novofer Foundation, 1998); György Osztrovszki Prize (Engineers for Peace Foundation, 1999), Pro Scientia Transsylvanica (Transylvanian Hungarian Technical Scientific Society, EMT, 2000); Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary (2005); Tódor Kármán Prize (shared, Minister of Education, 2010); Lifetime Achievement Award for Service to Talents (National Talent Support Council, NTT, 2014); Lifetime Achievement Award (NJSZT, 2021). In 2021, the National Talent Support Council invited him to be the Ambassador of Hungarian Talent.