Regina Saphier
Regina Saphier is a Hungarian NGO founder, writer, blogger, TED video subtitle translator, and EleMentor. In 2003 she started Project Retour in Hungary, the country’s first major repatriation project. It aimed to slow brain drain by helping Hungarian graduates and professionals return home and build networks through media and the Internet, later becoming a model for Central Europe.
She earned a Bachelor of Arts with Honors in Marketing Management from Oxford Brookes University in 1999, with a thesis on social marketing, business ethics, and corporate social responsibility. She then received a Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies in Education from Columbia University’s Teachers College in 2002, combining International Education Development, Giftedness, Adult Learning, Leadership, and Transcultural Studies. Her background in marketing, ethics, communications, and grant writing helped shape Project Retour.
Saphier represented the project in more than 50 interviews with local and international media, including BBC World Television and Reuters, and wrote articles for Magyar Hirlap and Nepszabadsag. She presented and moderated conferences in Hungarian and English, wrote business plans and grant proposals in both languages, and counseled hundreds of homecomers, conducting interviews and creating English-language case studies. She organized Hungary’s first international homecoming conference and helped create the first online community portal.
Hungary has a long history of emigration, with waves beginning around the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. In recent years, Saphier has focused on TED, freelance writing, publishing, and consulting. She translates Hungarian subtitles for TED Talks, reviews subtitles for other translators in Hungarian, German, and French, and runs a TED conference blog.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 16:33 (CET).