April 26, 2024

Nearly 60 Companies Head to the USA and Canada on Entrepreneurial Mission

Representatives of almost sixty Czech companies and universities will embark on a quest for business and entrepreneurial opportunities in the United States of America and Canada on Sunday, April 28th. In terms of the number of participating companies, this marks the historically largest entrepreneurial mission to both countries. Led by the president of the Confederation of Industry of the Czech Republic, Jan Rafaj, exporters will accompany Minister of Industry and Trade Jozef Síkela on the six-day journey.

During the entrepreneurial mission, representatives of Czech companies and universities will gradually visit Boston, Toronto, Chicago, and Seattle. As the journey primarily focuses on startups and innovative companies in the field of ICT and technological solutions, participants will have the opportunity to visit several research centres in technology, technological incubators, accelerators, and innovation centres.

“Our entrepreneurial mission to the USA and Canada is a fantastic opportunity for Czech companies or startups to launch their business in North America. Over six days, we have prepared a packed program full of personal meetings and encounters with local partners. We will also visit technological incubators and even the innovation center of Amazon. We are pleased to support bold Czech companies with good products or ideas,” says Jan Rafaj, President of the Confederation of Industry and Transport of the Czech Republic, who leads the entrepreneurial delegation.

“It is repeatedly confirmed that our relations with the United States of America are at a very high level. This also applies to the economic sphere, where the USA proves to be a very interesting destination for Czech entrepreneurs, as confirmed by the historically largest delegation of more than 50 Czech companies joining me on this entrepreneurial mission. These are companies active in information technology, science and innovation, cybersecurity, or biotechnology,” says Minister of Industry and Trade Jozef Síkela.

One of the many companies that aim to expand into the American market through the mission to the USA and Canada is SNADNEE, offering customized digital projects and tools. “This entrepreneurial mission is one of the first steps in SNADNEE’s expansion, and I believe it will open up new opportunities for us in areas such as healthcare and manufacturing, where we have deep knowledge and experience in application development, creating new digital products, and digital transformation of companies,” says Jan Ševčík, CEO of SNADNEE.

The entrepreneurial delegation also brings “good weather” with it. Czech technological company Forecasts. Cloud, specializing in applied predictive models linked to weather forecasts using machine learning, has already had success abroad – supplying data, for example, to OpenAI. Now it aims to significantly expand its portfolio of clients in the energy, insurance, and health tech sectors. “We have advanced applied technologies and interesting use cases that are in demand in the technological environment. Weather significantly affects business everywhere around us, and we help companies control these influences. I believe the mission will help us introduce Czech technological products to other significant companies in the USA,” adds Forecasts.Cloud Director Bohuslav Zeman.

The entrepreneurial missions of the Confederation of Industry of the Czech Republic to the USA and Canada, accompanied by Minister of Industry and Trade Jozef Síkela, are attended by startups and innovative companies from a wide range of industries. Selected quotes from other participants can be found in the attached press release appendix. Additionally, companies are not heading to the USA for the last time this year with the Confederation of Industry. In June, an exporters’ delegation will travel to Washington D.C. and New York, accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister for Digitalization Ivan Bartoš.

CONFEDERATION OF INDUSTRY SUPPORTS EXPORTERS FOR OVER 30 YEARS

The Confederation of Industry and Transport of the Czech Republic has been organizing entrepreneurial missions accompanied by high-level state representatives since 1993. Over the years, the Confederation has organized a total of 229 entrepreneurial missions to over a hundred countries worldwide, during which it has assisted more than 5,500 Czech companies and entrepreneurs. This year, the Confederation of Industry plans to take exporters, for example, to Morocco and Mauritania.

Editor’s Note:

The Confederation of Industry of the Czech Republic’s entrepreneurial missions to the USA and Canada, accompanied by Minister of Industry and Trade Jozef Síkela, will be attended by a total of 70 representatives from nearly 60 Czech companies and universities.

SELECTED QUOTES FROM OTHER PARTICIPANTS FOR POSSIBLE USE:

“As Canada is an associated country of the Horizon Europe program, the entrepreneurial mission to Canada can significantly contribute to building personal relationships for joint research, development, and innovation projects,” says Rudolf Fryček, CEO of AMIRES s.r.o.

“Involvement in the mission to the USA and Canada brings us a unique opportunity to meet with stakeholders from the startup and investment scene and expand the scope of our activities overseas. For the past several years, COPS has been successfully developing its cooperation internationally with startups and investors not only in FinTech and LegalTech, which are our primary focus but also with a whole range of other interesting projects. We develop technological solutions for new business ideas or products and can also assist startups or scale-ups commercially by sharing our experiences. Recently, we have developed an international legal aid platform, which brought together over 330 lawyers and, in about a year and a half, resolved over 4,600 cases using artificial intelligence in 30 countries,” adds Ondřej Dvořák, Co-CEO of COPS Solutions.

“This mission presents a great opportunity for us to establish new partnerships and deepen existing ones, both in the USA and Canada. In addition to several projects we are already negotiating, we plan to sign at least one contract in the ‘Sports Data and Business’ sector. Furthermore, we expect new collaborations in the ‘Principal Telemedicine’ sector, where we are starting a project with a prestigious research institute in women’s health, and we will discuss strategies and possibilities for developing cooperation with partners from both coasts. All these activities will open doors to further opportunities for our consultants, who will have the opportunity to work on prestigious projects and develop their skills in an international environment,” says Miloš Tkáčik, CEO of the PRINCIPAL group, including Principal engineering and Principal Technologies.

“Programmers from the Czech Republic and Slovakia have long met the requirements of global technology companies for top quality. Their work, in a competency comparison in the international market, shows high cost efficiency. Both are excellent prerequisites for companies from around the world to connect with IT experts from our region and gain access to IT skills that support innovation and growth,” says Jakub Konečný, CEO of TITANS, a Central European leader in providing IT specialists.

“In civic-tech, Decision 21 helps with citizen participation for dozens of cities, schools, and organizations. We have long been cooperating with the New York City Council, and the mission can help us expand into other American and Canadian cities,” says Renata Klánová, Communication and Marketing Manager at Decision 21.

Accompanying the entrepreneurial delegation is the ambitious startup VisioTherapy from VisionCraft, which aims to revolutionize physiotherapy, with the USA as its primary market. “We have had a challenging journey in developing revolutionary technology that brings a large part of physiotherapy into patients’ homes using affordable means such as mobile phones and televisions. Now is the time to expand and further improve the technology. A key part of our expansion is securing growth capital and local partners. The mission should help us with both tasks. In the USA and Canada, there are many venture capital funds specializing in investments in health-tech technology companies. In addition to capital, these funds also have exceptional expertise and contacts in the industry, which are as important to us at this stage as capital itself. We believe that this mission will help us establish valuable contacts,” says David Tuč, co-owner of VisionCraft.

“Our unique Strafos software for private aircraft operators, which helps customers price and optimize aircraft operations more quickly, is currently mainly offered in Europe. However, this year we plan to expand into the USA and Canada, and we see the upcoming mission as an opportunity to open doors and present on these significant markets,” says Martin Pultzner of Strafos.

“The delegation’s visit to the USA represents a significant opportunity for PrimeCell to negotiate with leaders in biotechnology and potential investors in our patents, as we aim to introduce our innovative medical technologies. We also want to take advantage of this opportunity to meet with our advisory team in the USA, which handles all negotiations with the FDA for market entry. For PrimeCell, establishing strategic partnerships is essential to support innovation and promote our mission to provide patients worldwide with cutting-edge medical technologies,” comments Stefan Savić, Global Business Development Officer at PrimeCell Advanced Therapy.

“The mission supports our strategic activities in North America in the fields of outsourcing services, team building, and industrial automation and robotics. We provide comprehensive solutions to strengthen personnel capacity, develop software, and implement production management systems (MES) and monitoring and control systems (SCADA). With a range of services covering everything from personnel consulting to software development and expert technology implementation, we are ready to be a reliable partner for digital transformation and automation,” says Matej Kult of AIKIT Digital.

Also joining the entrepreneurial mission is the socially acclaimed European company Good Sailors, which focuses on neurodiversity in the IT world. “We are trying to change the paradigm of health impairments and disabilities into superpowers. Thanks to these exceptional individuals, we are able to deliver unique projects in energy, security, or the gaming industry in Europe, and we would like to expand into the USA, where we already have some clients,” adds Filip Molčan, founder of the company.

“We are very pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this mission – it gives us the chance to establish new contacts and support our activities in the USA and Canada, where Trask recently opened branches. As a technological and consulting company, we aim to establish ourselves in both markets first in the finance sector, primarily in IT system integration, cybersecurity, and application modernization. However, we also want to offer IT services in other sectors, such as manufacturing, insurance, or telecommunications,” says Pavel Riegger, CEO of Trask Solutions.

Note:

The original press release (in Czech) published by the Confederation of Industry in the Czech Republic can be found on the SPCR website.