iconannual 2015 - The European Business and Investment Magazine

Slovakia
Greetings
Dear readers!
H. E. Juraj Macháč
Ambassador of the Republic of Slovakia to Austria
It is an honour for me to address you in iconannual –
the European Business and Investment Magazine –
which is published on the occasion of iconvienna –
the European Business and Investment Forum, a major
international innovation conference in Vienna. This important
forum includes the meetings of business leaders
and governmental representatives of all over Europe and
does a good run for exchanges of new thoughts and exciting
ideas on regional and global cooperation through
innovation and entrepreneurship. Following the motto
“Make Contacts to Contracts” iconvienna represents the
best arena for networking at a top executive level.
Slovakia had the honour to be last year´s – on behalf
of the 10th anniversary of iconvienna – main guest of
the forum. Key Slovak Speakers included Minister of
Economy Tomáš Malatinský, Neulogy Managing Director
Ivan Štefunko, Chief Architect City of Bratislava
Ingrid Konrad, Advisor to Ministry of Finance Stefan
Adamec, Director General Ministry of Transportation,
Construction and Regional Development Denisa Žiláková
and Vice-President of Slovak Academy of Science
Pavol Šajgalík. We had the privilege of the presence of
former Vice-President of Wirtschaftskammer Österreich
and the present Minister of Finance Hans Jörg Schelling,
who has delivered the speech concerning the excellent
Slovak-Austrian relations.
The key topics of this year: Smart Cities and Regions
2020, Innovation and Cooperation, International Finance
and Projects, Energy, Infrastructure and Transport,
Branding, IP Rights and youLEAD dialogue, give us –
representatives from the world of business, energy, politics
and diplomacy – the platform for discussing at expert-level
about innovation, new findings, knowledge
and business activities in Eastern and Western Europe,
directly in Vienna, the centre of headquarters of many
multinational companies and international organizations.
Modern infrastructure might be
regarded as a decisive factor for the success of a business
location as well as the prosperity of the population. According
to the motto of iconvienna „Make Contacts to
Contracts“, well-developed infrastructures are indeed
believed to be important „contacts” between cities, regions
as well as neighboring countries.
As Ambassador of the Slovak Republic to Austria, I
would like to thank the organizers of this conference.
Innovation is always a creative and inventive process
that combines existing things in a new way in order to
offer the market something unique. But it is also the way
to decrease the high unemployment in EU and to endorse
Europe as a global competitive player.
iconvienna itself has the characteristics of being
unique. As a representative of the Slovak Republic, I
welcomed the opportunity to participate in the preparations
of the event last year as a Guest Country. Under
the slogan: “Why wander so far when the good lies this
close” we managed to introduce an innovative and creative
Slovakia to the neighbouring Austria.
To conclude, I would like to wish all the organizers
and participants a successful conference full of fruitful
debates and outcomes. May this year’s conference be at
least as successful as the last one, or even much
more.
Foto: Slovakian Embassy
The European Business and Investment Magazine iconannual 27