On November 13, 2018, the Slovak Investment and Trade Development Agency (SARIO) organized the most prestigious international business-to-business (B2B) event in Slovakia - Slovak Matchmaking Fair Bratislava 2018. The event was traditionally held under the auspices of the Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic and offered the opportunity to find new business partners to 174 companies from Slovakia and another 19 countries of the world.The event was focused on new development trends in innovation, automation and robotics, as well as cooperation within Visegrad 4 Group. As part of the agenda, the participants talked about the strategic direction of the V4 industry, the competitiveness of industry in terms of innovation, robotics, automation as well as new concepts of mobility between companies and industry.The event also included three panel discussions on the following topics: innovation, e-mobility and automation, hosting real experts, representatives of established companies as speakers."Modern technologies, innovation and robotics have become part of our lives. And Slovakia is without any doubt following this trend: investments in science and research have doubled since 2006 and since then, they have grown by 15% each year. It cannot be reached only through qualified workforce we have in Slovakia. It's also thanks to the environment created by Slovak companies specializing in smart industry," said SARIO General Director Robert Šimončič.Slovakia has its Action Plan of Intelligent Industry. Priority areas for implementing the Action Plan are research, development and innovation, IT security, labor market and education and creation of technical standards. Fields of robotics, automation, digitization and information and communication technologies are part of the research and development strategy domains for smart specialization of Slovakia. There is a need to transform the Slovak economy responding to the digitization of the industry, with a view to launch a digitization process, innovative solutions and increasing competitiveness in most businesses, as well as a need to support industrial and service enterprises, regardless of their size."Ministry of Economy considers the Slovak Matchmaking Fair as a strategic activity in terms of support of pro-export activities and one of the forms of support for Slovak companies in their efforts to enter and succeed in foreign trade markets. On one hand, it represents a platform for Slovak companies willing to enter the global markets, and on the other hand, it gives the opportunity to foreign participants to establish new contacts with local companies. I am very glad that this successful event, taking place every year, intensifies its importance in ranks of the business community and brings many challenges and opportunities for the Slovak economy, "said 1st State Secretary of the Ministry of Economy SR, Vojtech Ferencz.In total, 174 companies from 19 countries participated at the Slovak Matchmaking Fair Bratislava 2018. They established contacts and cooperation at 590 pre-planned bilateral meetings and hundreds of informal meetings. The Slovak Matchmaking Fair has been one of the largest and the most prestigious international business-to-business (B2B) events for Slovak and foreign entrepreneurs in Slovakia for 12 years.You can find pictures of the event here: https://flic.kr/s/aHsmvK86oWHere you can see the video from the event:
