Emerging Europe Talks: Recent Episodes

Emerging Europe

Emerging Europe Talks is a series of discussions offering insight and intelligence designed to help entrepreneurs, investors, governments and all knowledge-seekers navigate emerging Europe. The talks focus on innovation and technology, sustainable social and economic growth, and help the right people identify the right opportunities and trends.

The series is delivered by Emerging Europe, a London-based intelligence, community and news platform whose mission is to foster the social, economic and democratic development of 23 countries in Central, Eastern, South-East and North-East Europe.

Technology increases productivity. But it also brings about other consequences: it creates, removes and modifies the tasks that are supposed to be performed. This in turn affects the demand for workers with new skills.

This is why equipping all young people with the skills to adapt and reinvent themselves is one of the three policy recommendations, alongside promoting technology adoption and adapting technology to meet society’s needs, included in the recent report The Future of Work: Implications for Equity and Growth in Europe, released by the World Bank.

“I'm talking about numeracy, literacy, problem-solving, and in particular social skills; the ability to work in teams, the ability to project a future and be consistent...the ability to listen to others. These types of skills, these foundational skills are the perfect complement of new technologies,” Rafael E. de Hoyos, programme leader in human development for EU member states at the World Bank and one of the report’s authors, tells Andrew Wrobel.

“These are precisely the things that we should provide to our students because this is what will allow them to re-invent themselves,” he adds. “[These skills] will allow them to benefit from technology, not compete with it.”

They also talk about the future of education and about how to prepare educational systems in Europe and the emerging Europe region for future challenges.

“I was working in a corporate environment, in a hotel, in the marketing department, and we were seeking professional travellers and family travellers [who could help us] promote our hotel,” Havva Safarova tells Andrew Wrobel.

“Unfortunately, I couldn't manage to find any travelling families who have a blog. One night my husband said to me: ‘You travel, we have kids, and you are a marketer so you can do it best’.”

Now, Havva is an internet personality and a content creator with thousands of followers. She also educates others. She is the author of seminars and marathons that empower women and emphasise that, “the limit of women is only in their brains.”

Like many mothers, she struggled with dividing her time between family and work.

“I couldn't work and manage, taking the kids to the kindergarten and then taking care of them. As a freelancer it was very hard; when you are in a corporate environment, you are working from nine to six. But when you are a freelancer, you are working 24/7.

“And I was sitting in coffee shops aware that people were watching...I was bringing my kids to the coffee shop and people were saying that they disrupted them.”

So, Havva came up with yet another idea: Ninja Kids Club.

“My mother was my first mentor. I remember her advice when I was a child. Back then, we had grades from one to five. Five was the best mark, four was okay and three was not very good. And one day, I came back and said ‘Mum, I got a four, and that’s really good because the rest of the class got threes.’ And my mother said to me, ‘Darling, you had better look at those who are ahead of you, not those who are behind,” Viktoria Konstantinova, Head of EMEA Talent Marketing at GlobalLogic, tells Andrew Wrobel.

With over 20 years in marketing across various sectors, Konstantinova now works for an international software company with 30,000 engineers worldwide and leads marketing efforts in 20 countries. Now she encourages other women to look for mentors.

"We are literally sitting and waiting for you to reach out and ask questions. This is a two-way street. This is not a monologue. This is a dialogue. While giving, we are receiving; and communicating with inspiring people, especially women who want to start a business or who want to change their lives. This is inspirational for us.”

“Our [solution] is an innovative platform for riders of any level to book and fully explore our tour features with the assistance of digital video routes. When you go to our website, you can see all horseback tours around Georgia. The platform's objective is to develop a niche market for equestrian tourism in the region,” Ana Nadiradze, co-founder of Horsetours, tells Andrew Wrobel.

“Ana has created a really interesting business and she can show how to combine ecommerce and equestrian tourism together,” says Diana Kiguradze, regional manager, Caucasus, CISSEE at Visa.

Not only that, she has introduced digitalisation to a sector that was analogue for too long.

“We are going to digitise the potential of equestrian tourists in Western Georgia and create a digital video road,” Ana adds.

“I am a person that loves experimenting and learning by doing. So, it was just this passion that I have for doing something that makes the world better, but by learning from others, by connecting with other cultures, and learning from those who have already done more,” Agnieszka Hryniewicz-Bieniek, Global Director of Google for Startups, tells Andrew Wrobel.

She has created a series of workshops called ‘I Am Remarkable.’

“We just wanted to support women to be more confident and to acknowledge their strengths, to acknowledge how great they are. Because very often we see female founders don't have that confidence. This is a very popular workshop right now, not only among female entrepreneurs but also any female audiences from students through regular individual contributors.”

Agnieszka comes from Poland and she cherishes the fact that she comes from Central and Eastern Europe.

“I come from this region. This region is diverse, with a lot of different countries, and a lot of different connections and languages. Somehow it's easy when you come from this region to actually manage a global team because you already know that there are differences, you already know that you have to listen and you understand the context of the other person from another country…because it all matters in communication.”

Today she manages Google for Startups initiatives carried out in over 125 countries including joint activities with over 60 incubators, accelerators, and co-working spaces.

Do we need to say that technology is changing every aspect of human life? No, we don’t—and healthcare and life sciences are no exception. Leading pharmaceutical companies explore data science and artificial intelligence (AI) to speed up the development and production of new and more effective medicines. Healthcare professionals use virtual reality to improve their skills. Patients use virtual tools to access medical services.

Both groups consume far more content than ever before. High demand for personalised customer experiences forces companies to invest more in tailored content production.

“We are all about storytelling, about content” says https://www.linkedin.com/in/andreychuk/https://www.linkedin.com/in/andreychuk/, one of the founders and CEO of Viseven, a MarTech services provider. “We are a digital content agency, a digital content factory for pharmaceutical clients. We create digital content, digital narratives. We create a content strategy, end-to-end marketing services, omni-channel campaigns. We build the entire architecture and infrastructure for marketing content.”

She speaks with Andrew Wrobel about leadership, entrepreneurship and disruption. One of the biggest disruptions for her was Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She turned it into an opportunity and her company’s team has since grown by some 50 per cent, now exceeding 700 people.

“I started [the business] on my second maternity leave 10 years ago. Before that, I was engaged in large corporations in high positions in marketing and public relations. [...] I used the pause to rethink my purpose in business and I started testing healthy oatmeal cookies, which was really strange back then,” Milica Ličina Čalija, the founder of Anđeli (Serbian for Angels) tells Andrew Wrobel.

“Now, we do have some kind of awareness of the importance of healthy eating. Back then, online shopping was not as developed as it is now. And healthy habits in eating were not as developed.”

The cookie producer now has eight employees, and seven of them are women. They are a social enterprise because all of the female employees are either over 45 years old, which is a group in Serbia that cannot be easily employed, or have some kind of chronic illness.

“It's a community, a kind of family. And when I say that I'm an activist and I empower women, I do not only do that through some kind of advocacy,” she adds.

But Milica is also an activist and runs her own podcast.

"I always talk about difficult moments and obstacles, thinking that if I share that experience, someone else will be encouraged to overcome the same obstacle,” she says.

Technology has significantly expanded access to education. We saw that firsthand during the Covid-19 pandemic. It has also begun to change the roles of teachers and learners. The teacher’s role is changing as students take more responsibility for their own learning using technology to gather relevant information.

But the impact of technology is even more profound than that. Advances in technology have led to the automation of many tasks, which has led to the creation of new job roles that require different skills.

“We need to really teach our students to adapt, to learn, constantly relearn what they've learned so far and unlearn certain things that would limit them from learning new things,” says Sayasat Nurbek, Kazakhstan’s minister of science and higher education.

He speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how Kazakhstan is reinventing its approach to education, its educational system and the role teachers play in the process.

Climate change affects all regions around the world, and the number of risks generated by changing weather conditions and disasters are increasing. Knowledge about potential risks is essential for their reduction, transfer, and adaptation.

Climatig is a Croatian climate fintech start-up that helps banks, insurers, facility managers, and real estate decision-makers mitigate climate risks such as drought, floods, extremely high temperatures, and more through the power of climate intelligence.

Duško Radulovic, Climatig’s CEO, spoke with Andrew Wrobel about his company’s solution to the challenges in obtaining reliable climate intelligence using geolocation with a precision of 10 metres. One UK-based investor considered flooding to be the main issue but after obtaining the coordinates it turned out wind might be a bigger risk.

They also discussed access to the solution. Currently, it is addressed at business clients but will soon be available for individuals who will be able to understand risks, for example, before investing in a new home.

“Moldova is no longer just a consumer of technologies. We are now a nation that exports and generates technologies,” the country’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economic Development and Digitalisation, Dumitru Alaiba, wrote on Linkedin in August. He shared the example of Informbusiness, a domestic company that has just launched the production of dynamically-charged electric buses.

“We have a booming IT industry. Year-on-year growth is 45 per cent, and 95 per cent of the IT services produced are oriented for export. Altogether, the IT industry in Moldova is about five per cent [of GDP] and if the sector grows even half as fast as it has over the past three years, I think we can double that soon,” he tells Emerging Europe’s Andrew Wrobel.

According to the Future of IT in emerging Europe report, 4.4 per cent of Moldovans are employed in the ICT sector. Across the 23 countries of emerging Europe, only Estonia has a higher percentage employed in the sector.

“We want to prove that it’s not just Estonia [that can be 100 per cent digital]. Any other country can do it if they take [digitalisation] seriously and if they believe it is possible,” Alaiba adds.

“We want to show that you can have a high quality of service when you deal with the Moldovan government, whether you are an entrepreneur, a citizen or a visitor. […] You don't need to go through a massive crisis in order to benefit from the digital transformation.”

It’s no secret that most start-ups don’t succeed. In fact, more than two-thirds never deliver a positive return to investors.

According to a recent Skynova study, 47 per cent of start-up failures in 2022 were due to a lack of financing, nearly double the percentage that failed for the same reason in 2021. Running out of cash was behind 44 per cent of failures, while 33 per cent of start-up failures were attributed to the Covid-19 pandemic’s wide-ranging effects on business and the broader economy.

Start-up founders often rely on their knowledge and experience, or that of external consultants, and mentors. And almost 60 per cent of almost 500 founders polled by Skynova said they would have done more market research prior to launching.

What if they relied on artificial intelligence to help them put together a business plan? This is what Hotball.ai intends to offer.

Maksym Nagara, the founder and CEO of Hotball.ai and the founder and leading consultant of Bezmezh.Consulting, talks with Andrew Wrobel about how the firm’s solution can help start-ups understand strategy and plan better.

They also talk about the reasons why start-ups often fail and how AI can help small businesses grow in a sustainable way.

“Before I started my internship at Visa, I [ran] a small eco-hotel in the mountains of Ukraine. It was a travel co-working space. It was after the first invasion in 2014. A lot of travel agencies were closed and travel managers needed to work somewhere so I decided to open a space where everybody could help each other and develop the travel industry,” Nataliia Ievtushenko, first an intern and now a full-time employee at Visa tells Andrew Wrobel in the eighth episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa.

“During the [internship] interview, I chose the product team. It's very interesting for me to see how products are created from the beginning, from the idea until the product is done.”

“I'm the head of the women's Visa network inside the company. And I used to be the mentor for some of the newcomers and some of the women in the network. It's really great to feel that your experience, your advice helps someone to grow or just to realise themselves, to achieve results or even to build a relationship with someone. It's important not only for the mentee but also for the mentor just to know that they are helping the younger generation grow, find new paths,” Svitlana Chyrva, Vice President, Country Manager for Visa in Ukraine and Moldova, adds.

“I changed companies for the first three roles that I had and then I came to Microsoft,” Michelle Simmons, General Manager Central Europe at Microsoft, tells Andrew Wrobel in the seventh episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa.

“And what I found was that I've been able to take on new challenges and really work for many different companies inside Microsoft by changing functions, changing geographies and expanding my scope of responsibility. And so that's how I've ended up spending so long at one company because it's been just a platform for incredible learning, professional growth.”

“I had the pleasure of first meeting Michelle earlier this year and during our conversations it was her approach to leadership that struck me most,” Andrew says. “That curiosity and authenticity, showing the way forward, especially now in such uncertain times and being able to create a vision for what the future looks like. And identifying and challenging talent in a supportive way so that they can move into their next role, even if it is at a different company.”

“I measure myself on how I'm helping people in my organization to achieve their career goals,” Michelle adds.

“There's been a lot of positive discussion and some positive progress when it comes to gender equality around the world, […] but I think clearly there's much more to be done to truly ensure the level of equality that we all aspire to and I think men have to play a vital role in that,” said Dan Baxter, Vice President, Corporate Communications for Central & Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa at Visa, in conversation with Emerging Europe’s Andrew Wrobel.

This is why halfway through the first series of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa, we take a look at the role of men in the development of female empowerment as the process must include the awareness and engagement of men.

“One of the steps is ensuring that you have a diverse work force to start with and setting very clear goals which are measured to ensure that you're continuing to increase the level of diversity within the organisation. [...] We need to show that there are significant benefits of having more women in the workplace, but also in the company environment.”

“Involving men in initiatives such as She’s Next contributes to a broader understanding that diversity is an enormous benefit in a workplace. I am also delighted to be the podcast host and I very much hope I will be able to help raise awareness about diversity and the value of female entrepreneurship,” Andrew added.

"When we started in 2018, […] it was really to try something new in the region and in our country [of Czechia],” Silke Horáková tells Andrew Wrobel in the fifth episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa.

“It was about convincing investors that impact investing is something valid and has a future. That it's worthwhile to invest for financial returns, and doing something good for society at the same time.”

Silke is one of the founders and a partner at Tilia Impact Ventures, one of the first impact funds in central and eastern Europe. She was previously the CEO of the Czech Private Equity & Venture Capital Association and is originally from Germany. She moved to Czechia during the Velvet Revolution. She is also the co-owner of Albatros Media, the largest Czech book publishing company.

“Silke says she is not an entrepreneur herself. Yet she’s co-founded quite a few initiatives, including the European Women in VC community that empowers founders who are making a difference in the world. What struck me is the passion she has for social and environmental impact. I very much wish we had more people that are so committed to supporting changemakers in the emerging Europe region,” Andrew says.

“Looking back to 2010, when I heard for the first time about the concept of impact investing, right from the start I had a deep desire to do something,” Silke adds.

The global ICT market is bound to grow. Digitalisation, cloud computing, Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) are only a few drivers of that growth. Global ICT spending reached about 4.9 trillion US dollars in 2020 and is expected to reach 5.8 trillion US dollars by 2023. That growth encourages entrepreneurs to set up new companies offering IT services.

MIhai Filip, the founder and CEO of Romania-based Oves Enterprise, and also a serial entrepreneur, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about why he set up a software engineering company and how he found his niche in that rapidly developing sector, how he continues to innovate on a daily basis and provide value to his partners and clients.

They also talk about his successes and failures such as working with high-profile clients in the private and public sectors, and working to acquire a new client and admitting his company was not ready for that client at the time.

“I was born into a century and a family that went through every kind of disruption imaginable in the course of about 70 years. I come from […] Central Asia, which has gone through tremendous turbulence: two brutal world wars, multiple civil wars in between every kind of disruption possible, and then that finished with the collapse of our government,“ Nadya Zhexembayeva tells Andrew Wrobel in the fourth episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa.

Her first job was in an insurance business selling life insurance in the collapsing Soviet Union. Now Nadya is a recovering academic scientist, entrepreneur, educator, and the founder and chief reinvention officer at Reinvention Academy.

“And if for some people stability is a norm, for me, turbulence is the norm and that makes me today in 2023 as we are facing the disruption we're facing in a competitive advantage, meaning I am more ready to deal with change.”

“Imagine this scene, a relatively young professor at the business school meets a vice president of a bank in the same class,” says Cristina Doros, now vice president, regional manager for Central Asia and Azerbaijan at Visa, who first med Nadya back in 2009.

“It's an inspiration because sometimes when you feel down, when you think your things are going south and you are so good at anything, then I see, I look at Nadya's speeches, I listen to her online, I read the post and I said to myself, OK, you know what, that's the meaning you've been missing.”

“You we are all learning from each other and in that environment, it's all about creating conditions where we can all share because the wisdom in the room is tremendous with all of these executives,” Nadya adds.

“I was born and raised in a family of engineers. All around me were gadgets and software, and I wasn't really excited about them. My father taught me how to programme. It was basic, and it was more than 30 years ago, and did not excite me that much,” Elena Marinova tells Andrew Wrobel in the third episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by VISA.

Elena is president and chair of the board of directors at Musala Soft, a software service company, founded in 2000 and currently with offices in Bulgaria, North Macedonia, and Egypt, and Emerging Europe’s Female Business Leader for 2020.

“But 2000 was the year of the dot com crash. We started with fancy Silicon Valley start-ups. Everything was super shiny…unicorns and rainbows. A few months later, we lost all our clients. And a year later, we were almost done. […] It turned out to be an extremely fun and dynamic field.”

Musala Soft was recently acquired by the KKCG Group and is now part of Qinshift, although it has kept its original brand.

“I have known Elena for a few years, and I cannot find another person who is so committed to supporting young generations of programmers, and not just in her home country of Bulgaria. Back in 2017, she co-founded the European Junior Olympiad in Informatics for kids from the Council of Europe countries and gave them a stage to compete and create friendships that will last for life and lead to scientific breakthroughs and a better and more connected world. And her enthusiasm is contagious,” Andrew says.

“If you like the things that you're doing, of course, you're doing more of them and it's not a nine to five thing. It's something you live with all the time,” Elena adds.

And she seems to have taken a liking to programming in the end.

“My background is the tourism industry, but when my son was born, he came with a bonus. [This is how] autism came into our lives,” Turkan Ismayilli, the founder of the YouTube channel Cin Bala with animations and fairy tales addressed to special children, tells Andrew Wrobel in the second episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by Visa.

Turkan started the channel during the Covid-19 pandemic, after her family had come to Germany and attending therapy sessions was close to impossible.

"Our direction is clear, and we started the YouTube channel [to help] autistic kids living in Azerbaijan who do not have a chance to go to therapy centres. [Thanks to these videos] children can learn to speak. We saw it day by day with our son and we have received a lot of messages [from others who say the same].

“To me, it is very much specific to women’s entrepreneurship overall because the research also showed that it's us women having a need from any standpoint, having the need to help, having a need to support our family, having the need to help our close ones move further. We are doers, we do stuff no matter how much we are afraid, no matter how much we are not sure. Mostly we are not sure, but we still do things,” adds Christina Doros, vice president, regional manager for Central Asia and Azerbaijan at Visa, who also joined the episode.

The world of social media is changing. In 2023, Elon Musk’s Twitter has 353.9 million users, almost four per cent fewer than in 2022, and is expected to lose another five per cent next year, according to BankMyCell.

Previously, it built its network thanks to three communities: politicians, celebrities, and journalists, who could broadcast directly to a large audience without any gatekeepers, build personal brands and promote stories that they believe are newsworthy. Trolls use Twitter because its algorithms give their content disproportionate weight in the conversation. As a result, according to MIT, falsehoods on Twitter spread 10-20 faster than facts.

Mark Zuckerberg’s Threads, launched on July 6, 2023, got off to a great start with over 100 million subscribers within just five days. But, according to SimilarWeb, Threads’ daily active user base dropped from 49 million in the launch week to 23.6 million now.

Where is news in this picture? Well, the average news platform subscriber is 50 years old. 40 per cent of 18-29 year-olds use social media to consume news.

Noam Bardin is the former CEO of Waze and the founder and CEO of Post, which he launched in November 2022. Post is an inclusive platform designed for social media natives and the way they want to consume news. He speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the future of the media industry, from both a consumer and publisher perspective.

They also talk about how to make sure that users are part of a community where debate is civil and constructive. They discuss a model that promotes access to content produced by premium publishers and countless experts and academics, without subscriptions or ads, using micropayments with publishers receiving the entire payment revenue.

“I'm a growth guide which means I support leaders and managers and start-up founders and some public figures in sorting out their businesses and lives,” Dragana ‘Gaga’ Djermanović tells Andrew Wrobel in the first episode of Emerging Europe Talks She’s Next empowered by VISA.
Gaga is a recognised and awarded personal and professional growth advisor. Through her extensive career, she has mentored more than 1,000 managers, leaders, public figures, and founders.

“I'm very passionate about supporting people who believe in their dreams and want to realise them, but suffer because they don’t have a clear goal or vision. Sometimes, even with a clear goal or vision, it's too small.”

“Gaga is a real inspiration for me. From being the youngest manager in a financial institution in Serbia in her early twenties, through leaving the corporate world to becoming a global influencer, she has shown that nothing is impossible. I was stunned by her remarkably positive attitude and her understanding of giving not only taking,” says Andrew.

"Wherever you are and whatever you have done so far, whatever you think you have, you can give to others. And that's an example, either ideas, context or you can even support someone's story: that's giving. And usually, people are building networks in order to receive,” Gaga says.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), a staggering 99 per cent of the global population breathes air that exceeds WHO air quality limits and threatens people’s health. More than 6,000 cities across the globe are now monitoring air quality, but the people living in them are still breathing unhealthy levels of fine particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide, with people in low and middle-income countries suffering the highest exposures.

In Europe alone, air pollution kills more than 1,200 children and teenagers per year, according to a report released by the European Environment Agency (EEA). It also significantly increases the risk of disease later in life. Meanwhile, 78 out the 100 most polluted cities in Europe are located in the emerging Europe region, according to IQAir.

Shajjad Rizvi MBE, the CEO of Hungarian start-up Resysten, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about Clean Air, his company’s solution. It utilises advanced binding technology and the principles of titanium dioxide and sunlight, which purifies the air through photocatalysis eliminating harmful pollutants associated with various health conditions.

They also talk about the challenges of communicating innovative solutions to potential buyers and how businesses can offset their carbon footprint by cleaning their air.

Tourism is one of the one of the largest and fastest-growing industries globally. In 2022, the entire market was worth over 10.5 trillion US dollars and it is expected grow by some five per cent per annum over the next five years.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the industry took a strong hit. It is certain that the future of sector will depend on digital and technological discoveries such as the use of chatbots to make reservations, mobility patterns to manage visitor flows, artificial intelligence, IoT, 5G, service-oriented robots, gamification methods for emotional monitoring and much more besides. These innovations will shape the new tourist experience.

Hristo Yanev, the founder and CEO of Bulgaria-based VIP Silven and a number of other companies, spoke with Andrew Wrobel about how his company has embraced autonomous vehicles and other innovative solutions in tourism.

They also talk about Hristo’s entrepreneurial path as he gives tips to other current and future business owners.

The coming years will be decisive for a sustainable future. The foundations will be laid for unleashing the potential of digital technology and the cloud as the innovation platform for green transformation. This applies to the corporate sector as well as to the public sector and society as a whole.

Petra Čiček, Sustainability Lead at Microsoft Central Europe, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how digitalisation, sustainability, and growth are interconnected and about how the digital skills of the general population are correlated with lower air pollution and more sustainable behaviour.

They also discuss the recent Environmental Sustainability Report, which confirms the company’s role in developing and advancing new climate solutions, but also recognises that the climate crisis can’t be solved by any single company, organisation, or government, and the Microsoft Sustainability Academy, which helps future leaders understand sustainability concepts and technology skills.

67 #EETalks Sustainable Impact — The Future of Education with SET University's Iryna Volnystka

Family businesses are at the very heart of emerging Europe’s economies. Set up within the last three-four decades, they now contribute meaningfully to the region’s economic growth, development, and employment — accounting for 40–50 per cent of all jobs in the private sector.

Despite the current challenging economic conditions, family businesses in the region have seen strong performance over the last financial year, with 83 per cent experiencing growth and only five per cent seeing a reduction in sales. That is more positive than the global picture – across the world, 71 per cent of family businesses grew while eight per cent saw a reduction.

Piotr Michalczyk, Poland-based partner at PwC leading the private business practice in Central and Eastern Europe, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about why family businesses in the region are doing better and are more optimistic about the future, as seen in the Family Business Survey, PwC’s global market survey among key decision makers in family businesses.

They also talk about how these companies perceive innovation and digitalisation and how they are embracing sustainability and environmental, social, governance (ESG) and how aware they are of the importance of proper succession planning.

Calculations made recently by University of Copenhagen professor Per Gundersen suggest that some 600,000 tons of CO2 could be stored per annum if all Danes simply allowed yard waste to decompose in their gardens instead of burning it.

Releaf Paper, however, a greentech start-up founded in 2021 by two Ukrainian innovators, has a different idea about how to use that waste. Their technology, developed by biotechnologist Valentin Frechka (currently 21 years old), allows the processing of fallen leaves and other green waste into cellulose, which is the basis for creating paper and some types of packaging.

This material is a direct replacement for primary cellulose obtained from wood. That leaf paper is fully recyclable and has a biodegradation period of only 60 days. As the solution uses raw materials it helps reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 78 per cent. It also contributes to forest conservation.

Alexander Sobolenko, chairman and general manager at Releaf Paper, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the solution and about how low awareness of alternative sources of paper is among potential business partners. Many are interested in sustainable solutions but find it hard to understand the concept.

They also talk about how other start-ups and small companies can understand their carbon footprint and what they can do to make an impact.

The Covid-19 crisis made people pay more attention—not less—to burning environmental issues such as climate change. The call for global climate action today is urgent, and companies are starting to recognise the need to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions—not just for the planet, but for the benefit of their own business.

However, in a survey carried out by the Boston Consulting Group in October 2022, only 10 per cent of 1,600 companies with 1,000 employees or more and revenues ranging from approximately 100 million to over 10 billion US dollars, across 14 major industries and 18 countries, said that they measure their emissions comprehensively (scope 1, 2, and 3), a one per cent increase compared to 2021. In the survey, respondents also estimated a 25 per cent to 30 per cent average error rate in their emissions measurements.

Linda Zeilina, CEO at the International Sustainable Finance Centre (ISFC) and a member of the EU Platform on Sustainable Finance, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the EU taxonomy of sustainable economic activities, a tool helping investors understand whether an economic activity is environmentally sustainable and navigate the transition to a low-carbon economy.

They also talk about sustainability education and finally about the CEE Sustainable Finance Summit, taking place on May 15-19, 2023, in Prague, Czechia, which is a specialised event focused on sustainability in finance and business in the emerging Europe region.

Business leaders across the emerging Europe region are grappling with significant economic headwinds and are carefully weighing decisions around strategy and investment. They are looking for ways to reduce operational expenditure, increase productivity and ensure rapid return on capital investments. Efficiency and business resilience have become their top priorities.

Digitisation helps make businesses stronger, more agile and better positioned to weather unprecedented challenges such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the impact of the war in Ukraine, or disruptions related to climate change. It also makes companies more secure.

For businesses looking to increase their security, the best thing they can do is be part of an infrastructure that is equipped to pick up and understand the signals, and ultimately prevent attacks even before they happen. By moving to the cloud, companies can leverage this strength and protect their critical infrastructure.

Kostas Loukas, General Manager Enterprise at Microsoft CEE, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about digital perseverance — an organisation’s ability to thrive despite risk provided they harness and wield digital technology to achieve their business goals and do more with less

They also discuss the areas where that digital perseverance can be built and strengthened — employee productivity, business continuity and supply chain.

Three out of four CEOs in the CEE region project that global economic growth will slow over the next 12 months. These expectations represent a sharp reversal from 2022 when two out of three CEOs foresaw an improvement, according to PwC’s Annual CEO Survey.

Despite their gloom about macro conditions, CEOs in the region are nevertheless quite confident when it comes to things they can directly control: they are more bullish than the global average on their own company’s revenue growth prospects over the next 12 months, with 46 per cent saying they’re “extremely confident”.

Russia’s war on Ukraine and growing concern about geopolitical instability have caused CEOs to rethink aspects of their business models and the way they perceive risk. While in comparison to the 2022 findings, cyber risks have slipped down the list of regional and global business leaders’ threat priorities (20 per cent said this is the top threat), the picture changes for their five-year outlook. Over that timeframe, cyber risks join inflation, macroeconomic volatility, and geopolitical conflict in the top tier of risk exposure.

Adam Krasoń, CEO of PwC in Central and Eastern Europe, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about where emerging Europe’s CEOs are looking for growth opportunities, how they are responding to short- and long-term threats, and about the region’s sustainable growth.

They also talk about the role of digital transformation in the region’s future as 45 per cent of all CEOs taking part in the survey don’t think their companies will be economically viable if they continue on their current path.

Adam Krasoń will be hosting a live PwC CEE webcast on Friday, March 17, at 10:30. The webcast will present results from the CEO Survey and a panel discussion moderated by Kasia Madera, BBC World, will look at the role of CEE executives in addressing the tough challenges faced by our societies. Register here.

Over the last year, businesses have had to navigate the choppy waters of inflation, growing uncertainty, the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic and the impact of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Yet in 2022, the emerging Europe region’s merger and acquisition (M&A) market proved to be extremely resilient — M&A activity maintained a steady pace, though deal values were notably lower than previous years.

According to the Emerging Europe M&A Report 2022/2023, by CMS, a law firm with 16 offices across the region, in 2022, there were 1,229 transactions, 5.6 per cent more than in 2021. The deal value, however, dropped by 20.3 per cent and amounted to 32.9 billion euros.

Horea Popescu, managing partner at CMS Romania, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the impact of the geopolitical and macroeconomic circumstances on investment in the region.

They discuss which sectors contributed to overall M&A activity in the region and are expected to attract more investment going forward. They also talked about future trends and the role of environmental, social and governance (ESG) on the M&A market.

It’s undeniable that governance is the forgotten or neglected one among the three ESG letters representing environmental, social, and governance. However, if real change is to take place, it may be the most important letter in the abbreviation.

Governance examines how an organisation polices itself, focusing on internal system controls and practices to maintain compliance. It looks at transparency, industry best practices, leadership management and associated growth initiatives.

With global ESG investment now exceeding 30 trillion US dollars, improvements in ESG execution are vital as strong and transparent governance underpins the planning, execution and reporting of any ESG strategy.

Bohuslav Lipovsky, managing partner at EIM Executive Interim Management CEE, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the state of governance in the emerging Europe region. They also look at practical steps that can be taken to improve governance, especially in small and medium companies.

They also discuss why doing business in and with Russia since the country’s invasion of Ukraine is contradictory to the ESG agenda and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

Both the public and the private sectors are experiencing a level of disruption and risk that have not been seen in generations, caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In such circumstances, some companies operate on the brink of bankruptcy and fail, while others innovate and grow. Some even thrive. What makes the difference? How prepared they are for change? How agile and adaptable they are? How well they have worked out their contingency plans? Or simply, how strong is their resilience?

Konstantin Vasyuk, executive director of the IT Ukraine Association, whose members employ over 85,000 IT specialists, spoke to Andrew Wrobel about the resilience of the Ukrainian IT sector.

According to a recent report, Do IT like Ukraine, the industry brought six billion US dollars in export revenue to the economy and grew by 10 per cent in the first 10 months of 2022.

They also speak about the factors that have played a role in the IT sector’s resilience and why Ukraine is ready to share its expertise with other countries.

After two referenda failed to secure LGBTIQ+ rights in Slovenia, in July 2022, the country’s Constitutional Court ruled that a ban on same-sex couples marrying and adopting was unconstitutional. In October, the country’s parliament passed an amendment allowing same-sex couples to marry and adopt, making Slovenia the first post-communist country to legalise both same-sex marriage and adoption.

Simona Muršec, the president of the Ljubljana Pride Association, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about victories and defeats in the fight for equal rights for all couples in Slovenia, and about how the country’s cultural and societal specifics have played a part in the process.

They also talk about the importance of embracing diversity and inclusion in the workplace. According to McKinsey, in the US, three in 20 LGBTIQ+ women and six in 20 men believe their sexual orientation will negatively affect their career advancement at work.

Muršec also emphasises the different approach to LGBTIQ+ issues of the younger generation, and the fact that there are still companies throughout the emerging Europe region that can afford to ignore diversity and inclusion.

It is estimated that a single Ethereum transaction consumes an average of 60 per cent more energy than 100,000 credit card transactions, while an average Bitcoin transaction consumes 14 times more energy. The average NFT transaction produces 48 kilograms of CO2, which is equivalent to burning 18 litres of diesel.

Does that mean that the metaverse cannot be sustainable? Well, not necessarily. Replacing physical goods with virtual or digital goods, or substituting in-person engagements with virtual interactions can contribute to substantial reductions in CO2 emissions.

Stephen Loynd, a futurist and the founder and principal at TrendzOwl, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about what the metaverse and artificial intelligence might mean for the environment and how business strategists envision the potential of the metaverse in various sectors.

They also discuss how we will live and work in the future, the skills that we all might need, the nature of the metaverse, the hype surrounding it and why it is still unclear how the phenomenon will develop.

Marginalised communities that are typically excluded from employment represent a massive potential workforce. They include people with disabilities, older workers, those living in remote, isolated, or depressed areas, or those who simply lack access to education.

With increased focus on shared value, an inclusive approach and environmental, social, governance (ESG), businesses are looking for both positive financial and social impact in their own practices, and in those of their supply chains.

The impact sourcing model can help business meet and exceed cost and quality objectives, opens up new talent pools that are more loyal — when given a chance — and provides an innovative new offering to clients in an industry looking for innovation.

Traci Freeman, a global business services consultant with a focus on impact sourcing, tells Andrew Wrobel what impact sourcing involves and what benefits it brings for both the organisation and the employee.

She also talks about how impact sourcing can be successfully implemented not only in poorer economies but even in the richest geographies. And finally, about why outsourcing in Ukraine, following Russia’s invasion of the country, contributes to making an impact.

Together, 27 countries of Central and Eastern Europe contribute to approximately 3.73 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, but the region’s share of global climate tech investment is only 0.79 per cent of the total, according to the CEE edition of PwC’s Net Zero Future50 report.

Climate tech investments in the region have risen from 10.6 million US dollars in 2013 to over 502 million US dollars in the first half of 2021 alone, but there is clearly room for more, not only investment but also sector and geographic diversity. Transport and mobility account for 59.8 per cent of that investment, and 74.8 per cent of start-ups are based in Estonia and Lithuania. The report also presents interesting insights into the most underfunded areas. Most notably, between 2013 and the first half of 2021, CEE start-ups in the food, agriculture and land use sector attracted just 2.26 per cent of total funding, and those in the energy sector a mere 1.29 per cent. Although Poland has the largest economy in the region, and it serves as a strategic hub for some industries, start-ups in Poland only raised 4.65 per cent of total CEE climate tech funding.

José Miguel Salazar Hernández, ESG Hub Manager at PwC CEE, speaks with Andrew Wrobel, about the report’s key findings, the impact start-ups make on the environment, the most active investment hubs and some of the solutions the top 50 start-ups offer.

They also discuss why each and every start-up should understand their own carbon footprint and consider implementing early-on impact assessment methodologies to support their value proposition.

Media for growth investments are receiving increasingly more recognition as powerful engines for sustainable growth.

Globally, there are today more than 30 specialised funds offering advertising and media services in exchange for equity. Over the last two decades, over 1,000 start-ups have raised media for growth funding including Zalando, AboutYou, Carwow, Pinterest, and Glovo.

Such investments play an important role in revenue diversification for media broadcasters, whilst start-ups benefit from customer growth, increased brand awareness, and guidance from media groups, all without having to spend cash.

Diana Florescu, CEO of Media for Growth, a global network of media for growth funds, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how start-ups can benefit from media for growth investment.

They look at specific companies’ growth and identify opportunities for start-ups in the emerging Europe region, where, so far, the market has not been yet explored.

The built environment accounts for 39 per cent of annual carbon emissions worldwide. In order to reach net zero, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has estimated that direct building CO2 emissions need to fall 50 per cent by 2030.

There are a lot of incentives aimed at making the real estate market more sustainable. Decreasing buildings’ carbon footprint is maybe the way to start. This must be addressed both in terms of embodied carbon and operational carbon.

While the first refers to greenhouse gas emissions arising from the manufacturing and transportation of building materials, the latter refers to greenhouse gas emissions due to building energy consumption. This needs to be taken into consideration in building construction, even considering what are the right materials to use in each situation.

Steffen Walvius, head of sustainability services for Central and Eastern Europe at JLL, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how much time and effort it will take to decarbonise the built environment globally and what specifically needs to be done to address the issue.

They also speak about environmental, social, governance (ESG) and sustainability in the emerging Europe region.

Emerging Europe Talks Success and Failure — Lawyering up with LegalAid’s Sona Salimli Alasgarova

The Covid-19 pandemic made it more difficult to seek justice in courts globally. According to the World Justice Project, 67 per cent of countries covered by the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index experienced declines in indicators that evaluate equal treatment and absence of discrimination.

At the same time as many as 94 per cent of countries in the index registered increased delays in administrative, civil, or criminal proceedings. In nearly two-thirds of countries, civil justice systems saw increased delays.

LegalAid is the first legal tech company in Azerbaijan. Coinciding with the Covid-19 pandemic, the law firm, together with the Bar Association of Azerbaijan, created a mobile application making it easier for citizens to communicate with the country's attorneys.

Sona Salimli Alasgarova, the founder and managing director at LegalAid, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about disrupting the Azerbaijani legal sector, serving those who need legal advice, and setting up a new law firm in her mid-twenties.

She also talks about how she wants to help other female entrepreneurs in Azerbaijan start their own businesses.

Oceans and seas cover almost three quarters of the earth surface. They absorb almost all of the earth’s excess heat and store some 93 per cent of all CO2.

Now, oceans, from where life itself arose, are dying. It is estimated that over 150 million tons of plastic is already floating in the seas and oceans. The great Pacific garbage patch, 46 per cent of which is fishing nets, covers 1.6 million square kilometres. As far as commercial fishing is concerned, some 2.7 trillion fish are caught every year, even in marine protected areas.

And there is an increase in chemical nutrients in the water, leading to excessive blooms of algae that deplete underwater oxygen levels, resulting in the development of so called dead zones. Such zones in the Baltic Sea have increased more than tenfold over the last century and the Baltic Sea now has the largest dead zone in the world.

Andrius Sutnikas, coordinator of the Lithuanian Maritime Cluster at the Klaipėda Science and Technology Park, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the challenges the blue economy currently faces, and some innovative solutions bringing more sustainable development to the maritime industry and offsetting climate change.

Throughout this summer, especially in July, persistent heat waves have affected significant parts of Europe, causing wildfires, droughts, evacuations and heat-related deaths. While the highest temperature across the emerging Europe region was recorded in Croatia — 39.4 Celsius degrees, the United Kingdom saw thermometer bars going beyond 40 degrees for the first time, while the mercury reached 47 degrees in Pinhão, Portugal on July 14 — the highest temperature among countries in Europe affected by heatwaves this summer.

Andreas Beckmann, CEO of WWF in Central and Eastern Europe, spoke with Andrew Wrobel about the consequences of inaction to protect the environment and the biosphere in the region on people’s lives, supply chains, and economies.

They also discussed the role of governments and businesses in setting up the climate action agenda, the role of environmental, social, governance (ESG) in reaching the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, and finally, sustainable growth in the emerging Europe region, including building a sustainable economy in post-Ukraine.

The first green bonds — or climate awareness bonds, as they were called — were issued 15 years ago by the European Investment Bank. Since then, the market has gone from niche to mainstream with plenty of options on offer: green bonds, sustainability bonds, and social bonds, just to name a few.

The accumulative value of such bonds exceeds three trillion US dollars globally. China is the world’s leading issuer and Hungary leads in the emerging Europe region.

Just recently, KPMG Hungary became an ‘Approved Verifier’ within the framework of the Climate Bonds Initiative, Climate Bonds Standards and Certification Scheme, which means the ESG team of KPMG in Budapest is authorised, as a third-party verifier, to certify that issuers and their bonds comply with Climate Bonds Standard criteria in the entire CEE region.

István Szabó, Director at KPMG Budapest, who has been leading the sustainability practice in Central and Eastern Europe for one and a half years now, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the standards bond issuers need to meet, about available sources of financing ESG (environmental, social governance) and about placing sustainability at the core of an organisation’s strategy.

They also talk about the mistakes that companies make when preparing to issue climate bonds and about examples of greenwashing — ecological arguments in order to forge an ecologically responsible image among the public.

Solar energy may be a renewable resource, but there are different ways of capturing solar radiation and converting it into usable energy.

According to the International Energy Agency, power generation from solar photovoltaics (PV) in 2020 is estimated to have increased by a record 156 TWh, marking 23 per cent growth from 2019. Solar PV accounted for 3.1 per cent of global electricity generation, and it remains the third-largest renewable electricity technology behind hydropower and onshore wind after overtaking bioenergy in 2019.

WeDoSolar’s smart balcony solar solution enables the users to lower their dependence on grid energy while also reducing the CO2 footprint by up to 600kg, which is the equivalent of 1,000 square metres of forest, and saving up to 25 per cent of annual electricity costs.

Karolina Attspodina, the start-up's CEO and co-founder, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the solution, helping to raise awareness about climate change and its impact on our everyday lives, enabling a large group of consumers to contribute to reducing their carbon footprint.

They also speak about Karolina’s path as a Ukrainian female entrepreneur in an industry that is dominated by men.

Relieving humans from repetitive, hazardous, and unpleasant tasks, decreasing costs and eliminating errors are perhaps the most obvious benefits of automation. But are they the most critical?

Even before General Electric coined the term ‘automation’ in 1947, workers worried about the implication of technology on their jobs and the security of employment. As early as 1936, the Trades Union Congress in the UK issued a leaflet demanding “a larger share of the benefits of increased output through innovation, with a shorter working week, a shorter working life and compensation to redundant workers.”

The point is that automation does not automate jobs. It automates tasks. For some people, automation has helped bring about a better standard of living and a more varied life, more efficient use of time, goods and materials, and an increased understanding of the world in which we live, which is critical in the context of the post-Covid Great Resignation or Great Re-Evaluation.

Andreea Baciu, Chief Culture Officer at UiPath, the first Romanian unicorn and a global software automation company, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about automation for good and about people being at the heart of automation both as enablers and beneficiaries.

In this podcast episode they look at robotic process automation (RPA) as a multipurpose tool helping to transform businesses as well as at the opportunities it creates for individuals to expand their skills and horizons, and most importantly, the impact it has on the environment, health and wellbeing.

The lockdowns caused by the Covid-19 pandemic encouraged a lot of individuals to start using financial apps more frequently with as many as 54 per cent of consumers using them every day, according to Open Up 2020 Challenge.

Europeans have become 52 per cent more likely to use fintech apps and 36 per cent say they now feel more comfortable using banking and money management apps since lockdown and trust them more.

In 2019, there were almost 3,600 fintech companies operating in the EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) region. Since then, the number of fintech start-ups in that same area surged by 160 per cent to more than 9,300.

The question is which app to pick as an individual investor to make sure you can make the most out of your money, and how to provide as much value as possible as a fintech start-up founder and a fintech app developer.

Dime Galapchev, the founder and CEO of FinqUP, a portfolio management app that is scheduled for launch in September 2022, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about democratising and decentralising portfolio management.

He also talks about running a start-up in a small country such as North Macedonia, where he comes from, about his successes and failures and gives tips and hints to new entrepreneurs working on providing new solutions.

Climate change is a serious threat and the costs of not tackling the challenge accordingly will increase over time. According to NASA, 2021 was the sixth hottest year on record, with the planet warming by 1.1°C above the average from the start of the industrial revolution. Greater frequency and severity of climate hazards can create more disruptions in global supply chains — interrupting production, raising costs and prices, and hurting corporate revenues.

Climate change and the environment appear to be the primary drivers of investment decisions by individuals considering environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors. They are, however, just one of the three areas that ESG concentrates on.

Social and governance factors are still not treated seriously enough. One of the reasons is that they are less measurable than environmental impact, according to Professor Bolesław Rok, an expert on sustainability management, the circular economy, values-driven transformation, and sustainable entrepreneurship.

In the first episode of the Emerging Europe Talks Sustainable Impact series, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Professor Rok, one of the founders of the Climate Leadership platform for business, powered by UN Environment, the head of Sustainability Transition at Koźminski University in Warsaw and the director of the Positive Entrepreneurship Research Lab.

They discuss the development of ESG in the emerging Europe region, the challenges that hinder sustainable growth and the factors that need to be improved to accelerate sustainability and awareness between both individuals and corporations in the region.

Web 3 is the next generation of the internet that aims at shifting power from big tech companies to individual users. What this means is that, rather than availing themselves of free tech platforms in exchange for their data, users can participate in the governance and operation of the protocols themselves. As a result, they become participants and shareholders, not just customers or products. In Web 3, these shares are called tokens or cryptocurrencies, and they represent ownership of decentralised networks known as blockchains.

MVP Workshop is a Serbian venture builder company focused on Web3, instrumental in creating over 50 blockchain products, including 2 unicorn companies, Celsius Network and Polygon. The company works on several blockchain projects focused on FinTech, Supply Chain, Asset Management and Healthcare.

Ivan Bjelajac, a serial entrepreneur, one of the founders and the CEO of MVP Workshop, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the future of blockchain technology. They also speak about his earlier experience in building Devana Technologies – one of the most successful Serbian tech companies whose solutions were acquired by GoDaddy, as well as his other successes and failures.

Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, the largest disruptions to work — growing supply chains and new technologies — have been joined by the physical dimension of work, or remote work, all of which has had an impact on productivity.

Readdle, the company behind several productivity apps such as Scanner Pro, Calendars 5, Spark email, Documents and PDF Expert, which have been downloaded over 180 million times worldwide, has set its mission to improve people’s lives with technology that focuses on productivity.

Denys Zhadanov, a board member and previously the vice president of marketing at Readdle, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how the company defines productivity and uses science and disruptive technologies to increase personal productivity. He also talks about the company’s successes and failures related to both marketing and products, and gives advice how to build a committed team.

In 2022, the global hotel sector is expected to hit just over one trillion US dollars, according to IBIS World. The industry might still take time to return to pre-pandemic levels — in 2020 the market declined by 39 per cent and then by another 22 per cent in 2021.

It is estimated that there are 17.5 million hotel rooms across the globe. In the first ten months of 2021, 665 new hotels opened in the United States alone, 21 in New Your City, 21 in Atlanta and 19 in Orlando.

The US is the next destination for Ligna Group, an interior design studio, procurement and project management firm in the hospitality sector, employing 2,500 people in Bulgaria and the United Kingdom with a portfolio of clients representing the leading hotel brands, restaurants and office spaces.

Genoveva Christova, one of the founders and owners (alongside Anelia Kassabova) and managing director of Ligna Group, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the company’s origins, successes, and challenges, and its further global expansion.

The world online language learning market is expected to grow at an annual rate of 18.7 per cent from 2020 to 2027, reaching 21.2 billion US dollars by 2027, according to Meticulous Research.

Established in 2014, Mondly, a globally-acclaimed language learning platform with a daring mission to break language barriers between people developed in Romania, now helps over 100 million users from 190 countries to learn 41 languages using virtual and augmented reality technologies.

Alexandru Iliescu, one of the founders alongside his brother Tudor and the CEO of Mondly, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the edutech app and the future of learning languages. They also talk about the company’s successes and challenges in developing a solution used around the globe.

From home delivery shopping to ordering a meal without even having to speak to someone, the digital world is transforming the human experience and e-commerce makes it all possible. But what if we could speak with someone and they could learn what we actually need and want?

edrone is a global company offering ready-to-go marketing automation scripts and CRM features adjusted to eCommerce processes with the largest pools of customers in the CEE region but more importantly in Latin America.

It has a vision for the voice-based future of eCommerce and runs a project that aims to create its own technology, allowing it to develop the AVA platform and assemble Autonomous Voice Assistants. AVA will increase the precision of search results and make them far more accessible than any current option.

Michał Blak, one of the founders and the CEO of edrone, an artist turned into a tech entrepreneur, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about his company’s plans but also about his success of building a global company, and lessons he has learnt from his mistakes.

Earlier this year, Sigma Software Group, a Swedish-Ukrainian company, acquired a Kharkiv-based IT firm specialised in fintech, blockchain and telecommunication.

It has grown the number of IT engineers by over 30 per cent since the acquisition. It’s another step in the development of the company, established 19 years ago by five young IT developers and now providing software development solutions and IT-consulting to almost 200 customers all over the globe and ranking in the World’s Top 100 Outsourcing Firms by IAOP.

Valery Krasovsky, one of the founders and CEO of Sigma Software Group, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the company’s growth over the last two decades and the support Sigma Software provides start-ups in both Ukraine, the rest of Europe and the United States.

Valery also shares the mistakes the company that have contributed to the company’s success and tips for young entrepreneurs that are embarking on the journey.

Grammy award-winning Ed Sheeran has sold more than 150 million albums worldwide, making him one of the world's best-selling music artists in history. In December 2019, the UK Official Charts Company named him the artist of the decade. Globally, Spotify named him the second most-streamed artist of the decade.

The lead single from his most recent studio album = ("equals"), Bad Habits is the UK's longest-running number-one hit in two years, topping the charts for 11 weeks.

But did you know that the comic book video for the single — which now has more than one million views on YouTube — was produced by Studio 351, a music video production company serving the needs of the music industry based in Skopje, North Macedonia?

Zoran Aleksikj, one of the founders and the CEO of 351 Studio, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the firm's work with Ed Sheeran’s team, about the studio’s other productions for musicians such as Bruno Mars and James Blunt, and labels like Universal or Atlantic Records.

He also shares a few stories about the challenges and failures that he has had to overcome along the way.

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Click here to download a free copy of the Future of Sustainability in Emerging Europe report

Tuum is a next-generation core banking platform. It underpins the aims of both regulated banks and other businesses in meeting customer needs and aspirations by enabling the rapid rollout of new financial services. In September, the company — formerly known as Modularbank — changed its name to Tuum, which means “core” in Estonian, highlighting both its native roots and its goal to help customers supercharge their business from within through the use of its banking technology.

The company was founded in 2019 by a small group of Estonian financial IT pioneers and entrepreneurs who have a strong background in banking, including Vilve Vene, now the firm's CEO.

In the two years that the company has been operating, it has seen rapid growth and has already acquired an impressive customer base throughout Europe. It currently employs over 60 people across Europe with offices now in Tallinn, Berlin and Malaga. In December 2020, it closed a funding round of four million euros.

Vene speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the development of fintech during her career, which now spans more than two decades, about women in tech, and about her own successes and failures on the way.

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Redesigning public services and supporting digital transformation with automation — click here to download a free copy of the white paper.

Over the past decade, Israel has seen the birth of over 11,000 start-ups: 70 of which have gone on to become unicorns.

Israeli tech companies have attracted investments of more than 65 billion US dollars. So what sets Israeli entrepreneurs apart, in terms of thought, creativity and innovation?

Adi Barel, managing director at the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) hub in Israel, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the Israeli approach to doing business, success and failure, the importance of tachles, chutzpah and yalla and - most importantly - what emerging Europe's start-up founders can learn from the Israeli approach.

Large platforms such as Facebook, Amazon and Google collect more personal data than their users can imagine. The sensitivity of that data depends not just on what it contains, but on how companies and governments can use it to exert influence and data privacy is as much about these platforms’ knowledge about their users as about their ability to shape their users’ personal lives.

Julian Zawistowski, a visionary, an entrepreneur and the founder of the Golem Foundation, spoke with Andrew Wrobel about how to give power back to the users, how to protect personal data, donating personal data and the challenges emerging Europe is facing as far as data security, cyber-attacks and surveillance are concerned.

The limited financial knowledge of Tajik consumers means that more than 40 per cent of the population spends all their income and accumulates debt.

According to available data, only 11.5 per cent of all Tajik adults hold accounts at financial institutions and only 9.1 per cent of women. The situation looks better in Uzbekistan, where 36 per cent of surveyed adults report owning an account at a formal financial institution, according to the 2020 Financial Capability Survey.

However, Tajikistan has thriving fintech start-ups which are helping the country catch up. Alif, a challenger bank headquartered in the country, has over 600,000 users and a team of 700 professionals. It is now establishing its presence in the UK as part of its 2021 growth strategy, bringing greater financial stability, efficiency and inclusion to the market.

Zuhursho Rahmatulloev, one of the founders of Alif Bank, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about his return to Tajikistan after his studies in the UK, the opportunities Tajikistan and Uzbekistan offer and the bank’s plans to contribute to the social change the two countries are facing.

Building and managing a global business has never been simple.

It naturally has strategic benefits such as the ability to access new customer markets, new suppliers, and new partners. But it also has challenges like language barriers, cultural differences, political nuances, strategy development and allocating resources can struggle to cope with the increasing diversity of markets, customers, and channels.

Against this backdrop, there is emerging Europe — a region that has achieved notable albeit uneven gains over the last three decades and has been an incubator to thriving, competitive companies, which do not always want to remain in the region once they have acquired international status.

Oleg Krot, managing partner at TECHIIA Holding, a group of companies operating globally in various sectors but still headquartered in Ukraine, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how he and his business partner have been building an international business for less than a decade.

He shares his challenges and even mistakes and offers tips to those who also dream of going global.

In the early 1990s, after years of underdevelopment, the banking sector in emerging Europe had to start from scratch, playing catch-up with its peers elsewhere.

Now, in many areas, it leads. The development of mobile banking applications has progressed further and faster in terms of their innovation, functions and consumer adoption. Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, retail customers have adopted digital banking services en masse, as high street branches remained closed and cash transactions have plummeted.

In 2019, the Bank of Lithuania launched a fintech sandbox, a fintech-conducive regulatory and supervisory environment designed to foster innovation in the financial sector. So did the National Bank of Ukraine. A healthy environment for fintech start-ups has emerged in recent years which, coupled with strong digital infrastructure and talent, has resulted in a new wave of investment within the region.

Michael Rogalskiy, co-founder of Monobank and Koto, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the development of fintech in Ukraine and across the region, and the opportunities the sector offers.

The podcast highlights some of the opportunities that will be discussed during the UK-Ukraine Fintech Summit, which will be held in London and Kyiv on July 15. Click here for more info.

According to Google, 97 per cent of all internet users search for local businesses.

A strong online presence is therefore a critical component to marketing — regardless of the size of business and the sector.

Social media contributes to that presence significantly by generating additional revenue and building customer loyalty. And there is a large audience to cater to. DataReportal says there are 4.33 billion social media users around the globe.

Katerina Sukhenko, the founder and chief business development officer at PostoPlan, a fast-growing automated marketing platform for small and medium businesses, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the importance of building that online presence and offers some advice about how to optimise the process.

Although Georgia is a relative latecomer to the tech industry, recent developments and initiatives have shown a promising commitment to developing the industry.

With its slowly-improving education system and with 515 ICT specialists employed in the sector per 100,000 people, the country might still have quite some work to do but there is no question that its start-up scene is growing fast.

In May this year SpinCar, a leader in digital sales systems for the automotive industry, acquired the Georgian start-up Pulsar AI. As a result of the deal, the value of the Georgian company has already climbed to several tens of millions of dollars.

That event is bound to encourage others to follow suit, and there are plenty of Georgian start-ups to watch: Agronavti, B2C.GE, Kernel, PAYZE, CarDeal, Cargon, Phubber, Stack. Initiatives such as the 500Georgia acceleration programme are helping to raise awareness about the opportunities the country offers.

In this podcast, Emerging Europe's Andrew Wrobel speaks with Alina Rozanova, partner at TITANS Playground creative studio, former CEO of Touch Platform and country ambassador for Georgia at Tech Emerging Europe Advocates about the start-up ecosystem in Georgia, the challenges it faces and the opportunities it offers.

She also discusses how involving Georgian entrepreneurs in the Tech Emerging Europe Advocates community might help the ecosystem evolve further.

Innovation and digitalisation mean open, transparent and convenient opportunities for citizens and business.

While 59.5 per cent of the global population are active internet users, Central Asia is one of the least digitally connected regions in the world. However, national governments, particularly in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, have lofty digital ambitions. That process is enhanced by young entrepreneurs with creative ideas that offer various solutions and a large consumer market of some 75 million people.

Bruno Balvanera, a non-executive independent director of the supervisory board of Asakabank in Uzbekistan, a former managing director for Central Asia at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and an advisory board member at Tech Emerging Europe Advocates, speaks with Andrew Wrobel and shares his views on social and economic development in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, the five countries included in the Tech Emerging Europe Advocates community, as well as how investment can drive innovation, entrepreneurship and digitalisation in the region.

Travel is what usually comes to mind when thinking about Montenegro, and it's no wonder.

In 2019, before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, some three million tourists arrived in the country, which has a population of less than 650,000: the tourism sector accounts for almost a quarter of Montenegro’s GDP.

Beyond tourism, however, the country also boasts a thriving entrepreneurial scene with an increasing pool of young and creative talent.

Uroš Bulatović, the founder and president of the Union of Young Entrepreneurs of Montenegro, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about some of those creative young Montenegrin entrepreneurs, the opportunities the country offers, and the challenges it faces.

South Korea is one of the four Asian Tigers, which have steadily retained a high rate of economic growth since the 1960s.

It started as an agriculture-based country and is now the world’s 12th largest economy, its GDP worth 1,619 billion US dollars. The value of the country’s technology exports has grown more than 20 times since the beginning of the millennium to reach 13.8 billion US dollars.

Yonho Kim, associate research professor of practice and associate director of the Institute for Korean Studies at the George Washington University, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about the drivers of the country’s transformation, its current challenges, geopolitical ambitions and the potential of its collaboration with emerging Europe and the wider European Union.

The discussion is part of the Emerging Europe and the Asian Tigers: Towards 2030 programme, in partnership with Money Today, South Korea’s leading business media platform, and the K.E.Y Platform conference scheduled to take place on April 29, 2021.

Click here to register and/or take part in a survey looking at the political and economic relations between emerging Europe and the Asian Tigers.

Two in five Europeans feel that digital technologies are spreading too quickly, while nearly the same amount (39 per cent) say that the pace of change is overwhelming, according to a recent survey by eToro.

Despite the relatively low level of digital penetration, Poland values digital technologies more highly than any of the other nine countries, while Romania’s support for increased digitalisation across various sectors is second only to Poland.

Monika Czerwonka, a professor at the Warsaw School of Economics and an expert in behavioural finance with specific interest in cognitive reflection test and experimental finance, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how the Covid pandemic has impacted the way we make use of services, shop, invest and spend and what digital skills we will need in the future.

French President Emmanuel Macron doesn't have a good track record of collaboration with the emerging Europe region.

In 2017, he said that Poland, where a nationalist, eurosceptic government took office in 2015, was moving in the opposite direction to Europe on numerous issues and would not be able to dictate the path of Europe’s future. He annoyed governments in the region when he pledged to take steps to counter “social dumping” in France in which companies employ cheaper labour from the poorer eastern European states, threatening French workers’ jobs, during a debate about the EU posted workers directive. In 2019, Macron’s desire for a strategic reset in relations with Russia caused further rancour in the region.

What went wrong between France and emerging Europe? Is France losing ground in the region?

Romain Le Quiniou, managing director at Euro Créative, a French think tank focused on the emerging Europe region and a fellow at WISE Europa, speaks to Andrew Wrobel about the need to trigger a debate about future relations between the region and France and the need to raise awareness about opportunities in the region.

He also discusses the cliches and stereotypes French people have about what they call New Europe, as those that Eastern Europeans have about France.

The emerging Europe region’s IT sector has in recent years garnered a reputation for producing high-value services through the use of a talented, skilled labour force, operating at consistently high rates of productivity.

Indeed, the sector has become key to the development of national economies across the region.

However, the countries of emerging Europe are not particularly well integrated - either politically or economically. It has been quite the challenge to look beyond the large IT powerhouses of Ukraine, Poland, Belarus and Romania to understand the full potential of the industry across the region.

Emerging Europe recently took up that challenge and is currently putting together a comprehensive IT landscape report, the first-ever survey of the IT sector across the entire region.

Oleksii Toporkov, a research analyst at Emerging Europe, speaks to Andrew Wrobel about the report's methodology and some of the findings, including the IT Competitiveness Index which will be included in the report, due to be released on February 25, 2021.

The volume of apparel and footwear being produced globally was expected to have grown by 81 per cent to 102 million tons in 2020, according to report published by the Global Fashion Agenda in Copenhagen and the Boston Consulting Group in 2019.

But is the fashion industry becoming more sustainable? What is the difference between fast and slow fashion? Are consumers aware of the trends? And how do young designers see their future in the industry?

Dr Magdalena Płonka, director of collaborative educational initiatives and research and a corporate social responsibility lecturer at the International School of Costume and Fashion Design (MSKPU) in Warsaw, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about creativity and entrepreneurship in the fashion industry in emerging Europe.

Pandemic or not, start-ups are popping up at an exponential rate across emerging Europe and the rest of the world. Cities, regions and countries are now all trying to understand how to best assist these emergent ventures and how to establish the kind of environment that is conducive to increasing their success.

In the latest edition of Emerging Europe Talks, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Jerzy Brodzikowski, general manager at theCambridge Innovation Centre Warsaw, about what comprises an entrepreneurial ecosystem that brings results.

The pair also discuss why an organisation founded over two decades ago in Cambridge, Massachusetts, decided to set up its first innovation centre in emerging Europe, why Warsaw was chosen as the location.

History has long demonstrated that epidemics spur innovation and new solutions. City sewerage systems, public transit and housing regulations are just a couple of examples.

The Covid-19 pandemic has forced us to reboot much of our urban living - from home to office, park to restaurant. Some cities have increased parkland, others cycle lanes, others have redesigned public spaces. Architects are rethinking urban infrastructure to promote a more local way of life.

But there are still challenges: access to local parks, and providing more outdoor space for restaurants and cafes to cater to customers while maintaining social distancing.

What are the right solutions for a specific community? How to anticipate what a city needs and what its challenges are? And how to use technology to enhance and accelerate these changes?

Finally, how to build a coalition of stakeholders: city halls, businesses, citizens to make sure the changes help all members of the community?

In the first episode of Emerging Europe Talks in 2021, Andrew Wrobel speaks to Radu Puchiu, one of the founders of H.appycities, a Romanian start-up that builds digital platforms and mobile applications that empower communities, regions, cities or countries to think and act intelligently, aided by technology, for the benefit of the citizens.

In December last year, concepts such as lockdowns, quarantine, mask mandates, hand sanitisers and social distancing were unknown to most of us.

Over the last twelve months, however, they have become some of the most frequently used phrases across the globe. The Covid-19 pandemic has changed our plans, goals, routines, habits and has literally distanced us from other people. In the meantime, international organisations have called for a great reset, or to build back better, and we have started talking about the new normal.

In the final episode of the Emerging Europe Talks series for 2020, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Anamaria Dutceac Segesten, an associate professor at the Department of Strategic Communications at Lund University, and an expert in political communication, social media, European politics and democracy, about the changes to our social, economic and political lives that the pandemic has brought about.

Diverse business and political leaders are more likely to create greater value, spot and address risks and challenges than people with a similar background, culture, of the same gender and of the same age and experience. But is leadership gender-specific? What defines a business and a political leader? Should we look at fairness and quotas or rather at merit? How can women contribute to solving the challenges of a highly polarised public debate?

Andrew Wrobel speaks with Olga Grygier-Siddons, a business advisor and a mentor with over 30 years of experience working in professional services advising private and public sector clients in more than 30 countries. She is also a former CEO of PwC Central and Eastern Europe and the first female Member of the PwC Global Strategy Council. Passionate about responsible leadership and personal growth, she is launching an Experiential Learning Hub for leaders and their teams to acquire new insights, knowledge and skills to respond to global challenges.

Few people from outside emerging Europe have witnessed more changes in the region than Craig Turp, who has lived and worked across Central and Eastern Europe for almost 25 years, first for travel guide publisher In Your Pocket and for the past three years as editor of Emerging Europe.

In this edition of Emerging Europe Talks, Turp speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how the region's transition has been uneven, and how emerging Europe is often portrayed far too subjectively in the international media. He also discusses the importance of partnership and collaboration between all of the region's stakeholders, from both inside and outside emerging Europe.

The implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015 made Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance – or ESG – paramount for investors across the world. Although Impact Investing and ESG Investing were, back then, niche investment strategies, the UN’s SDGs marked the onset of a paradigm shift in the investment landscape – establishing the first voluntary link between sustainability and financial services.

So where does emerging Europe stand when it comes to ESG integration? Does the region lag behind Western Europe?

Marek Dietl, the CEO of the Warsaw Stock Exchange, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how perception plays an important role across emerging Europe, and says that companies are far more ESG-compliant than they are given credit for. The Warsaw Stock Exchange’s ESG Index and the ESG guidelines created by the Budapest Stock Exchange, ahead of that prepared by Euronext, the biggest stock exchange in Europe, are only a couple of examples of the region’s focus on sustainable development.

Two weeks before its pivotal presidential election, the United States pledged up to one billion euros to the Three Seas Initiative (3SI).

What many people are now wondering, however, is will the initiative be equally important to the Joe Biden administration? Is it of strategic importance to the United States?

And what is the future of the Three Seas Initiative now that a dedicated commercially-managed investment fund has been launched? Will it include other countries, like Ukraine? Will it compete with the European Union, especially now that Poland, the main country behind the initiative, has vetoed the EU budget, which could cause a serious crisis in the EU. Why is the EU less interested in the Three Seas Initiative?

In the latest episode of Emerging Europe Talks, Thibault Muzergues, Europe programme director at the International Republican Institute, discusses the initiative from both an American and European perspective.

Today's technology start-ups thrive on fast delivery, implementing user feedback, and pivoting their approaches. However, testing assumptions, mediocre applications, and isolated solutions can end a project before it even gets off the ground. That’s why they need an innovation-driven environment to truly thrive – a community of like-minded people. This community should be not only local, but also regional and global, as is Tech Emerging Europe Advocates, part of the Global Tech Advocates network that includes almost 20,000 start-up founders, entrepreneurs, investors, mentors and experts.

Russ Shaw, the founder of Global Tech Advocates, London Tech Advocates and London Tech Week, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about why joining Tech Emerging Europe Advocates can help start-ups to connect with tech entrepreneurs and investors globally, and about the role of the London tech ecosystem going forward.

Serbia's technology sector is booming, already accounting for six per cent of the country’s GDP and employing around 45,000 individuals. In 2019, the country exported 1.5 billion euros worth of IT products and services. The gaming and blockchain sectors are booming. The government has digitalized a lot of its public services and introduced coding classes in primary schools.

Nenad Paunović, director of the IT and Entrepreneurship Team in the Office of the Serbian Prime Minister, and previously one of the founders of the Belgrade Venture Forum, the largest innovation, investments and entrepreneurship event in the region, speaks to Andrew Wrobel about how Serbia has sped up on the route to become a digital economy over the last few years.

The Covid-19 pandemic is changing the way we eat, with the number of British consumers turning to a plant-based diet growing faster than ever. In June this year, there were 1.1 million vegans in the UK, and the number is set to double by the end of this year. In the US, demand for plant-based food has climbed by 268 per cent since the beginning of the pandemic.

Europeans spend about 1.2 billion euros on vegan products, still only a small fraction compared to the 230 billion euros that they spend on meat, but the market is growing fast, even in erstwhile holdouts such as Poland, where even traditional meat and dairy producers are including plant-based products in their offer. It is estimated that there are now three million vegans or vegetarians in what was until recently a strictly meat-focused country.

Dobrosława Gogłoza, head of strategy at the Warsaw-based All Hands Agency, which focuses on ethical marketing, spoke to Andrew Wrobel about sustainable production, business opportunities in the plant-based sector across emerging Europe and how companies should promote their products to a wide audience.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected both traditional media and online platforms. It’s not only an unprecedented economic challenge. Social distancing disrupts the complete physical media value chain. It rewrites basic rules of life, including communication and also accelerates previous issues like privacy, fake news, unfair competition, outdated regulation, political advertising, copyright issues What is the future of the media sector? What challenges are traditional and new media outlets facing? What is the ideal revenue sources? Is there room for new players and start-ups?

Kinga Incze, one of the co-founders and the CEO of Whitereport Global, a UK-based cross-media business intelligence service provider, and of Mediaspace.Global, a global independent professional network for media, marketing, tech, regulation, speaks to Andrew Wrobel about the role of businesses and governments in shaping the future media landscape.

Tallinn-based property and fintech start-up EvoEstate, which Emerging Europe included in its list of 10 start-ups from the region to watch in 2020, continues to disrupt the real estate market and make it more democratic for retail investors.

In mid-September, the real estate crowdfunding aggregator had 210 projects in its portfolio and with a pre-seed round closed, EvoEstate will now turn its attention to taking its innovative real estate investment platform global to begin providing services to interested investors around the world.

Gustas Germanavičius, one of EvoEstate's co-founders and the start-up's CEO, talks to Andrew Wrobel about real estate crowdfunding, the impact of Covid-19 on real estate transactions, and about the prospects for crowdfunding across the emerging Europe region.

Which international sales method should be used when selling software as a service (SaaS) to UK buyers? How to understand the way British buyers do business? What role do language skills and small talk play in the process?

And how to sell during the Covid-19 pandemic?

In the latest episode of Emerging Europe Talks, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Kasia Lanucha, a Cambridge University lecturer recognised as a cross-culture thinker and coach, and Bob Spence, the director of international business development for SaaS incubator C4DI @TheDock, who jointly run a series of seminars focused on cross-cultural sales, launched by the UK Department of International Trade.

In April 2021, the Warsaw Stock Exchange will celebrate its 30th anniversary. In the three decades since it was launched, it has achieved a great deal, not least being classified as a developed market by FTSE Russell – an achievement that took the Korea Exchange over 50 years. It is now on course to become a global gaming hub, with over 60 gaming companies listed, more than the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the world's current leader.

In this latest edition of Emerging Europe Talks, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Marek Dietl, CEO of the Warsaw Stock Exchange since September 2017, about how the bourse is focused on innovation and technology and how it plays a key role in attracting investors to the emerging Europe region through, among other things, its CEEPlus index.

IT service providers from across emerging Europe, especially smaller ones and those from less-known geographies, often struggle to present their value proposition to international buyers looking to outsource to the region. Buyers do not always know where to look, for a start, nor can they be sure that the provider who may have recently approached them by email offers a decent standard of service.

Is finding a perfect match possible?

In order to make the process simpler and smoother, Emerging Europe has partnered with Clutch, a US-based platform listing over 150,000 organisations, with more than 35,000 in-depth client reviews, specifically in the IT and business services sectors, to shine more light on service providers in the emerging Europe region. Together, we have launched a partner platform focused on the emerging Europe region.

To discuss this new initiative, as well as much more, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Mike Beares, the founder of Clutch. Prior to Clutch, Mike led a team of solution managers in the consulting and systems integration unit of Unisys Corporation. Earlier in his career, he worked in management consulting advising both Fortune 500 companies and smaller start-ups.

In mid-August, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Czechia, Slovenia, Austria and Poland signed a new defence agreement with Poland that will see American troops redeployed from Germany. He also seems to have brought Central European governments on board in the US’ diplomatic offensive against Chinese influence, specifically Chinese tech giant Huawei’s involvement in 5G networks. The next several months are also challenging to the US: the COVID-19 pandemic resulting the economy seeing a 9.5 per cent slump in the second quarter following a 1.3 per cent drop in the first, nationwide protests following the killing of George Floyd and the upcoming presidential election, to name just a few. Andrew Wrobel speaks with Tyson Barker, Deputy Executive Director and Fellow at Aspen Institute Germany, about the US relations with emerging Europe and the post-election scenarios, ahead of the Emerging Europe and the United States: Towards 2030 conference scheduled to take place on August 27. For more info about the debate, go to emerging-europe.com/towards-2030/

The coronavirus that kept people contained in their homes for three months has already reoriented our relationship with the outside world and with each other, and will have an enormous impact on how we interact, how we do business and how we use technology to replace our habits and basic needs such as building and maintaining relationships with other people.

On top of that, the pandemic came when humanity was already struggling to communicate, mainly due to fast-paced technological advancements. How to define modern communication? How to link human interactions with inhuman technology? What skills to acquire to be able to better communicate in the future?

Andrew Wrobel speaks with Victoria Masso, the founder of Behaviour Hackers. Victoria is an international trainer based out of Birmingham in the UK. She’s been working on building bridges between technological advancements and human interactions using behavioural science.

She has received special recognition by the UK government as an exceptional talent in the technological sector and has consulted on how to accelerate digital innovation all over the world with the International Telecommunication Union, a United Nations agency.

Numerous research studies show a strong correlation between employee experience and customer experience, with one claiming that companies with highly-engaged employees outperform their competitors by 147 per cent.

But how can firms increase customer satisfaction during the Covid-19 pandemic, when most, if not all employees are working from home? What challenges do employers face in terms of retention and recruitment? How are modern technologies, including robotic process automation, artificial intelligence, and cognitive-focused software, impacting the evolution of the customer experience?

Andrew Wrobel speaks with Peter Ryan, the principal analyst at Canada-based Ryan Strategic Advisory. Peter is a globally renowned expert on customer experience, having worked with businesses and governments across the globe, advising them on matters ranging from vertical market penetration and service delivery to best practices.

Some parts of emerging Europe are once again opening up to international tourists, while others - including some countries which have been successful in fighting Covid-19 - have delayed reopening for fear of reigniting the pandemic.

Few industries in the region have been as seriously impacted as tourism, more so even than in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the global financial crisis of a decade ago. What will the post-coronavirus travel and tourism industry look like? How will services change and what can the industry across emerging Europe do to embrace these changes and new trends?

Andrew Wrobel speaks with Mark Baker, a freelance journalist and travel writer, based in Prague since 1991. He has authored a number of guidebooks about Central and Eastern Europe, and his travel stories have appeared in National Geographic Traveller, BBC World News, and The Wall Street Journal. In the past, he has also been a correspondent for The Economist and Bloomberg.

Poland will finally hold a presidential election this coming Sunday, June 28, having postponed the original vote, scheduled for May 10, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In our latest podcast, Andrew Wrobel speaks to Aleks Szczerbiak, professor of politics and contemporary European studies at the University of Sussex, and the author of the Polish Politics Blog, about the election and the effect that the delay has had on its outcome. With three candidates given a chance of making the second round run-off – the current president Andrzej Duda, Mayor of Warsaw Rafał Trzaskowski and Szymon Hołownia, an independent candidate and media personality – Andrew and Aleks look at what a victory for any of the candidates could mean for Poland’s political future.

Investment promotion agencies responsible for attracting foreign direct investment seem to have been in suspension during the pandemic. Andrew Wrobel speaks to Elias van Herwaarden, principal at Locationperspectives consultancy and a member of the Site Selectors Guild, about the global trends in the business services industry, growth in the sector in the last few years, future prospects as well as emerging Europe potentially benefiting from the Covid-19 pandemic, as buyers look to relocate more distant locations to those closer to home.

The coronavirus has been with us in Europe since the end of January and it is clear that it has changed our lives in an unprecedented way. In this episode of Emerging Europe Talks Health, Andrew Wrobel speaks with Balázs Fürjes, managing director at EIT Health InnoStars, about the impact COVID-19 will have on health care and health tech in both the region and globally.