The international entrepreneurship conference and business matchmaking event „Baltic Spark”, which was organized by JCI Latvia and took place on April 16-17 in a newly established „Tallink Hotel Riga”, created a great opportunity for entrepreneurs from the Baltic States, Scandinavia and Europe to come together in an excellent environment for business brainstorming and development of already existing business ideas.
The conference Baltic Spark gave a possibility for small enterprises to gain new experience, which is crucial in the current constantly changing business environment. Gints Miķelsons (Managing director of the business client department at Lattelecom) claims that „Despite the pessimistic macroeconomic forecasts, in the first months of 2010 one can see slightly positive trend – the number of new companies has increased. In March, there are 1000 new enterprises. Although partly this trend can be justified by the fact that some companies are just switching their legal forms in order to reduce risks, a substantial part of these young firms are completely new.”
During two days current and potential entrepreneurs got acquainted with tax and accounting environment in the Baltic States and took the opportunity to evaluate the most suitable market and legal form for their business, understood the importance of intellectual property in the international development, got acquainted with IT solutions applicable in every company and market and export intelligence. The panel discussion about the business environment and its different forms in each of the Baltic countries turned out as an interesting exchange of ideas among representatives of each of the countries and conference participants. In addition to that, it seems that everyone who attended the Delfin Vassallo’s lecture about the digital marketing will always remember his most famous quote “if you cannot be found in google, you do not exist”, and accordingly adjust one’s digital marketing strategy.
Ginta Šmite (owner and designer of brand „Purpurs – dizaina papīrlietas”): In addition to knowledge gained during seminars, I would like to note the wonderful atmosphere which encouraged participants to be open and share their ideas. The schedule of the conference with an excellent evening event let participants feel free and get acquainted with new people. By the end of the conference everyone had met several new acquaintances and potential business partners, which is exactly how things are done in JCI!”
Supporters of the conference: SIA Lattelecom, Tallink Hotel Riga, SIA GP Systems, SIA Digital Mouse, SIA Baltic Cargo, SIA 2RFinance, SIA viaPro, SIA Umbra, Eurolines Lux Express, Puķunakts.lv, Hansabuss, Sorainen, Zelmenis & Liberte, Ernst & Young, Gateway baltic, LATA, LDDK, LTRK, LBKA, SIA Lietišķās informācijas dienests, Association Līdere, Enterprise Estonia, Enterprise Lithuania, Invest Lithuania, LIAA EEN, B2Binfo, Office Manager, Buzzpodium.lv, One.lv, Nozare.lv, Delfi, Financenet
Organizers of the conference the global network JCI Latvia (Junior Chamber International) is an international non-profit organization, which connects young professionals and entrepreneurs ages between 18 and 40 in more than 100 countries with more than 200000 active members across the globe, giving them the opportunity to develop themselves, their leadership skills, social involvement and responsibility, entrepreneurship and cooperation with peers, creating positive change in the society. More information about JCI can be found: www.jci.cc
