Company founders

Prior to founding Maya Technologies, Philippe Mattia and Marc Donikian worked together for six years for a leading technological consulting and engineering group in Grenoble. Learn more about the people behind the Maya success story.

Portraits of success


Philippe Mattia

Philippe entered the world of research & development very early on. After earning a degree in political science, he decided to round out his finance and economics background with a Master’s in the management of technological innovation. Degree in hand, Philippe left the student life for the army, where he completed his military service—skis at the ready—in his native Alps.

In 1994 he was hired for a sales engineering position with a software manufacturer and developer. His responsibilities included launching a new product line, and he created an indirect sales network covering French-speaking Europe. Six years later, after moving up through the sales department ranks, he left the SME with the satisfaction of a job well done.

In 2000 Europe’s leading technological innovation consulting firm came knocking at Philippe’s door, and convinced him to come on board for new challenges. It was then that his path crossed Marc’s at the firm’s Grenoble branch. This new opportunity allowed Philippe to lead a team of more than 40 consultants and to develop the firm’s R&D and information systems businesses. In 2005, he took the helm of a 120-person business unit.

Philippe’s sense of entrepreneurship and his knowledge of management issues soon gave rise to a desire to have a third child—a child called Maya!


Marc Donikian

Marc has always taken a broad view of business, and from a very early age he harbored a desire to start his own company—what kind of company, however, was a question he was not yet able to answer. After completing a general engineering degree at leading French engineering school ENSAM, Marc completed his education with a management degree. He came out of the experience convinced that in order to start a business, you need an idea, a network, and money.

Since he hand none of those things, and to gain some hands-on experience, he accepted a position as a consultant with an energy and environmental management firm serving local governments. He then left to join a management consultancy, where he was tasked with creating and developing its energy-management consulting business.

In 1996 he was hired to manage the Rhône-Alpes subsidiary of Europe’s leading technological innovation consulting firm. There he honed his sales, recruitment, and negotiating skills. He then founded a microelectronics business focused on industrial clients in and around Grenoble and, later, Aix-en-Provence, Sophia Antipolis, Milan, and Neufchatel.

In 2007, the dream Marc had harbored since his youth came true when he founded Maya Technologies with Philippe.

Website design: ID Nova