It is sometimes difficult to set aside the time to think freely and engage with new ideas in the midst of the hustle and bustle of daily work.
So I was thankful to spend the weekend in Slovakia's majestic mountains, where I attended the Tatra Summit – a key opinion-shaping forum organized by Slovakia’s GLOBSEC – for the first time.
This was a chance to engage in an intimate and informal setting with policy makers, financiers, and enterprises from across the Eastern and Central European regions.
In a session on intellectual property (IP) and the digital economy, I first spoke and then took part in an exciting conversation about how the pursuit of an innovation and digital economy in this part of the world will shift asset creation from tangible to intangible assets. Participants shared the challenges of R&D and IP commercialization, the relative lack of capital funding, and the mindset towards risk – but we were all excited about the strong foundations in this part of the world that will just require some patience for a vibrant innovation ecosystem to fully establish.
At a working dinner hosted by Mr. Peter Kažimír, Governor of the National Bank of Slovakia, and with central bank leaders from Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Slovenia, and Ukraine, we discussed how IP is shifting from a legal right to a business and financial asset, and about the opportunities and challenges this posed to the region’s financial services ecosystem and sector.
Central bankers are not company that I normally keep, and WIPO is company that they normally don’t keep, but we had a great conversation and agreed that we need to do more to bring the world of finance and innovation together.
In the end, the Tatra Summit was a great mix of serious talk, social engagement, and cool weather, and reminded me that engagement cannot be behind a screen, but must be in person. Kudos to the GLOBSEC team for organizing this event for the 12th year, and I look forward to finding more opportunities to engage with the Tatra Summit community.
Photo: GLOBSEC
#WIPO #TatraSummit2023 #Slovakia
Marketing Manager at Hong Kong Trade Development Council
3wThank you Olivier ZEPHIR, PhD. for introducing the innovative startups to me. Look forward to their presence in Hong Kong!