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Jan Michal, CEO, CzechInvest
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Jozef Síkela, Minister of Industry and Trade
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Ana Novik, Head of Investment Division, OECD
Ana Novik is Head of the OECD Investment Division in the Directorate for Financial and Enterprise Affairs. She supports the Director in DAF’s contribution to the strategic orientations of the Secretary General, with a focus on improving the international investment climate, promoting good domestic policies to support sustainable investment, including in areas such as FDI qualities, investment promotion and facilitation, investment treaties, and investment policies related to national security.
She establishes strategies for the OECD to maintain its leadership role in this policy area and to advance a more structured economic analysis of investment flows and impact. She also contributes to OECD-wide initiatives, including horizontal work streams on climate, global value chains, and contributions to the G20. Between 2011 and 2014, prior to joining the OECD, Ana was the Ambassador Director of Multilateral Economic Affairs in the Economics Directorate of Chile’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
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Stratos Kamenis, Economist and Project Manager, Investment Division, OECD
Stratos Kamenis is an Economist at the Directorate for Financial and Enterprise Affairs of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). As part of the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Qualities Team, he coordinates the OECD’s work on the contribution of international investment to productivity growth, innovation and digitalisation.
Prior to his current role, he worked across the investment, trade and entrepreneurship policy areas at the Business and Industry Advisory Committee to the OECD, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Trade and an EU Affairs consulting firm. He holds a Master’s degree (M.A.L.D.) with a specialisation in international finance and development economics from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University (Boston, USA), and a Bachelor’s degree in political science from Sciences Po Paris (France).
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Madison Lucas, Policy Analyst, SMEs and Entrepreneurship Division, OECD
Madison Lucas is a Policy Analyst at the OECD Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities (CFE), working within the SMEs and Entrepreneurship Division. As part of the Unit on SME and Entrepreneurship Transformation, she contributes to the OECD’s efforts on the digital transformation of SMEs and the enhancement of FDI-SME linkages. Prior to joining the OECD, Madison gained experience in the private sector, working with Fintech and Cybersecurity startups in Australia and Israel. She holds a Master’s degree in International Security, with a specialization in digital security and East Asia, from Sciences Po Paris (France), and a Bachelor of Arts degree, with a specialization in International Relations and History, from the University of Melbourne (Australia).
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Lucia Cusmano, Acting Head of the SMEs and Entrepreneurship Division, OECD
Lucia Cusmano is Acting Head of the SMEs and Entrepreneurship Division and Head of the Unit on SME and Entrepreneurship Transformation at the OECD Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities (CFE). She coordinates the development of the OECD SME and Entrepreneurship Strategy and leads work on SME digitalisation, green transition and internationalisation.
She has authored OECD reports on SME financing, innovation and sustainability, and benchmarking of SME and entrepreneurship policy. Ms Cusmano has a PhD in Economics from the University of Pavia (Italy) and has completed a Master of Science in Economics at Warwick University (UK). She has published in international journals on SMEs, entrepreneurship, innovation, globalisation, structural change and economic development.
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Lukáš Rosůlek, Head of Vitesco Technologies CZ, Vitesco
Lukáš Rosůlek is a graduate of the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at Prague's Czech Technical University (ČVUT) and completed a bachelor's course in Industrial Engineering at IHK BZ Dresden. He is married and has two children. He began his professional career as a trainee at Škoda Auto, where he later served as a Production Manager. He held the same position at Linde Kaeltetechnik and F.X. Meiller. In 2007, he joined Continental, where he held leadership positions in Frenštát pod Radhoštěm, Trutnov, and in Manila, Philippines. Since 2019, he has been responsible for all operations of Vitesco Technologies in the Czech Republic as the Head of Vitesco Technologies Czech Republic, overseeing the Trutnov plant. His hobbies include cars, motorcycles, and ski touring.
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David Uhlíř, Innovation Ecosystem Architect and Chief Strategy Officer, JIC
David Uhlíř holds the post of Innovation Ecosystem Architect and Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) at JIC (South Moravian Innovation Centre). He is involved in developing new strategic initiatives, involving public sector, academia and businesses. Over the last 20+ years he worked at different positions in the field of regional policy and research and innovation policy (Czech Ministry of Regional Development, Regional Development Agency of South Moravia, and Czech Ministry of Education) and also spent four years as a seconded national expert at the European Commission, DG Research. He participated in a number of international assignments related to design of innovation and research policies for OECD and European Commission at the EU level and in several countries. Since 2013 he represented Czech Business Innovation Centres in the Board of Director of European Business Innovation Centres Network (EBN). Between 2016 2019 he acted as EBN Vice-President and between 2019–2021 as its President.
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Gabriela Bauerová, Director of Division of Investment and Foreign Operations, CzechInvest
Gabriela Bauerová graduated from the Faculty of Law at Charles University. She has been with the CzechInvest Agency for Business and Investment since 2017, initially focusing on visa support for foreign investors. She then led the Investment Development Department. Since March of this year, she has been heading the Division of Investments and Foreign Activities, which focuses on promoting the Czech investment environment, attracting foreign investments with higher added value, and developing multinational companies in the Czech Republic.
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Daniel Mazur, Councilor for the capital of Prague
I am a graduate physicist, and I was an active research practitioner for about 11 years before moving to the job of Project Manager for Science, Research and Innovation. I am an analyst, democrat and cosmopolitan by background. I value freedom most of all and in politics my motto is that powers as well as freedom must go hand in hand with responsibility. After the Jan Kepler Gymnasium and the Prague Matfyz from 2002 to 2006, I did my postgraduate studies in the States at the Illinois Institute of Technology and the Materials Research Institute of Argonne National Laboratory. I did my first postdoctoral stint at the University of Geneva and the second one back at the Prague Matfyz.
Since 2012 I have been profiling myself as a project manager with increasing intensity and in 2014-16 I had a mixed research and project management position as a "scientific fellow" at CERIC-ERIC, which was then being established. Subsequently, I worked for almost two years at the Centre for Knowledge and Technology Transfer at Charles University.
I have been a member of the Pirates since 2014. I originally joined in Prague 6 and since 2016 I have been active in Prague 5. I founded the local Pirate association there and was its chair for four years. After the local elections in autumn 2018, I was the mayor of the Prague 5 municipal district for ten months. Half a year after leaving the opposition, I started working at the newly founded Prague Innovation Institute. I emerged from the municipal elections in 2022 as a councillor and in February 2023 became a councillor for IT, Smart city and VVI.
Since 2017, I have been contributing work at other levels of the Pirate Party. Until autumn 2022, I led the education departmental team, from January 2020 I am a member of the Republican Committee for Prague, and from 2021-2022 I was chairman of the Prague regional association. I have left the work within the Pirates to smoothly fill almost all of my free time. I relax with books, audiobooks and strategy computer games.
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Mikuláš Bek, Minister of Education, Youth and Sports
From 2011 to 2019, Mikuláš Bek served for two terms as the Rector of Masaryk University in Brno and was also the Vice-President of the Czech Rectors Conference for education. He represented the Czech Republic in the Council of the European University Association. In 2018 he was elected as a senator for the constituency of Brno-city and became first the Vice-Chairman and later the Chairman of the Senate Committee on European Union Affairs. Prior to his appointment as the Minister of Education, Youth and Sports in May 2023, he served in the government as the Minister for European Affairs and successfully led the Czech Republic's presidency of the EU Council in the second half of 2022.
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Shalini Sharma, Talent Boost Network and Diversity Manager, Business Finland
Shalini Sharma is a visionary leader with a passion for progress, diversity, and growth! She has 18+ years of experience in international business, marketing and communication, in various industries, especially in high-tech and fintech. Currently she leads Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) initiatives in Work in Finland unit at Business Finland. She works closely with Finnish SMEs, fostering a more inclusive business landscape and diverse company culture. One of Shalini’s superpower is bringing positive energy.
Join us as Shalini shares her insights on leveraging diversity and strategic leadership to navigate today's ever-changing business landscape. Get ready for an engaging and empowering discussion that will leave you motivated to drive positive change in your organization!
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Jana Skalková, Head of the Department of advisors in the Cabinet of Minister Marian Jurečka
Sociologist, HR manager; Social Policy graduate.
Jana took up the position of the Chief advisor to the Minister of Labour and Social Affairs after many years of experience in the field of business: as an HR manager in the area of People and talent management, she worked in banking and the field of telecommunications.
Previously, she had worked for 4 years as a project manager of the European Diversity Charter Programme, the aim of which is to help find and support employment for people with respect for their stage of life and social situation.
In 2009, she co-created the still unique Programme of the ČSOB Bank (the Czechoslovak Business Bank) for mothers and fathers, which was awarded the HR Excellence award in 2011 for supporting the reconciliation of family and work life for parents of young children.
By connecting business, state administration and legislators, Jana strives to create conditions for an efficient, sustainable and flexible labour market that respects the needs of all its actors.
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Ladislav Janíček, Rector, Brno University of Technology
Ladislav Janíček is currently a rector of Brno University of Technology, who has over 20 years of experience in senior management roles at two esteemed Czech universities – Brno University of Technology and Masaryk University. In his capacity at both institutions, he has actively contributed to finance and project management, participating in various working and advisory groups on higher education funding at both the national and international levels. He was also deeply involved in setting up quality assurance systems in relation to the transfer of international qualifications standards to the Czech Republic, such as MBA, MPA, and LL.M. studies. Since assuming a leadership role at BUT, he has been a vocal advocate for professional discourse on the advancement of technical education as a societal priority in the Czech Republic and the EU.
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Aleš Cáb, Site Manager and VP of Manufacturing, Onsemi
Aleš joined the company in 1993 after he had finished his master’s degree in electro technology at Brno University of Technology. He started as a process engineer at diffusion in Rožnov fab and took one year training at Motorola Toulouse. His experience and analytical skills took him into manufacturing where he built fab capacity model and started planning and participated in fab expansion. Later, he became wafer fab Manufacturing Manager and then Operations Manager. Under his leadership fab successfully transferred many technologies and significantly expanded capacity. His 15 years fab experience, ability to lead multifunctional teams and orientation to results qualified him in 2008 to his current role of Rožnov site manager with responsibility of two fabs CZ2 and CZ4 and supporting departments in Rožnov. Rožnov site is now undergoing significant expansion and transformation to silicon carbide technology which would not be possible without Aleš’ dedication and visions.
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