IT Ukraine Association’s Post

🚀 Europe must strengthen its competitiveness by empowering its European tech and digital companies. That's why France FinTech has united with 19 trade associations and 26 leading companies to advocate for 9️⃣ concrete actions to drive change: ✅ Complete and harmonise the EU Single Market ✅ Empower European tech companies to lead globally ✅ Develop a strong and responsible data economy ✅ Enhance talent attraction and retention ✅ Boost funding for Europe’s ambitions ✅ Make business easier and faster in Europe ✅ Take a problem-based and tailored approach ✅ Boost productivity with digital tech uptake and diffusion ✅ Effective enforcement of existing rules to level the playing field and foster innovation It’s time to position Europe at the forefront of the global tech landscape. Let’s make these actions a reality! Allied For Startups | BESCO - The Bulgarian Entrepreneurial Association | Dansk Erhverv | Digital technology employers' association | Dutch Startup Association | Ecommerce Europe | Izba Gospodarki Elektronicznej | European DIGITAL SME Alliance | European FinTech Association (EFA) | European Tech Alliance | FEDMA | Federacja Przedsiębiorców Polskich | France Digitale | France FinTech | Internet Economy Foundation (IE.F) | Italian Tech Alliance | ZWIAZEK PRACODAWCOW TECHNOLOGII CYFROWYCH LEWIATAN | techNL | SAPIE - Slovak Alliance for Innovation Economy | Unicorns Lithuania https://lnkd.in/eqZ3Ef5b #DigitalTransformation #EuropeanTech #Competitiveness #Innovation

Exciting news! AZUR SEZ has been featured in Companies Digest in an article titled "Building Business Beyond Borders: AZUR SEZ’s Role in Enhancing Global Trade and Investment." This feature highlights the significant advantages and opportunities AZUR SEZ in Anguilla offers to tech, fintech, crypto, and AI startups. Here's what makes AZUR SEZ stand out: Strategic Location: Anguilla’s prime position in the Caribbean provides easy access to major markets in North and South America, Europe, and beyond. Coupled with political stability and robust infrastructure, it’s the perfect hub for international trade. Comprehensive Benefits: 0% Income Tax 0% Corporate Tax 0% Import Duties 0% Export Duties 100% Foreign Ownership Global Connectivity: Our innovative virtual city lets businesses establish online offshore companies, reducing costs and administrative burdens. This environment also offers a directory of virtual companies and a global portal for SEZ commerce and trade. Financial Services: In partnership with EQIBank, AZUR SEZ guarantees corporate bank accounts (subject to due diligence), making international transactions seamless. Human Resource Advantages: Multi-year zone employment certificates offer significant benefits for employees and their families, ensuring job security and a supportive environment. Our tailored training programs equip your team with the skills needed to excel in tech, fintech, crypto, and AI industries. Flexible Business Setups: Choose between virtual and physical business setups to best align with your operational needs and strategic goals. Ready to explore the possibilities with AZUR SEZ? Visit AZUR SEZ’s website to learn how we can help your business expand beyond borders and achieve unprecedented growth.

🦸♀️🦸Competitive, Visible, and Valued Internationally.”Lithuanian Fintech Global Reputation as a Force to be Reckoned With💪 As the world increases the move into the digital space every year, the Lithuanian fintech sector plays an ever so important role. The number of licensed enterprises in this sector is steadily rising, innovative solutions are being developed, and their success is recognized both on local and global levels. Lithuania is attracting continuously more fintech companies, startups, and foreign investors, creating a vibrant ecosystem for financial technologies. “Today, we have over 270 Fintech companies, and in terms of market size on a global scale, Lithuania ranks tenth. It is evident that we are an internationally recognized Fintech hub – a favorable regulatory environment, an innovation-promoting ecosystem, and highly qualified specialists are just a few reasons why this sector continues to grow successfully,” says Minister of Economy and Innovation Ausrine Armonaite . To enhance the potential of the Lithuanian fintech ecosystem and provide opportunities for its members to establish valuable international contacts, the Innovation Agency Lithuania, in collaboration with ROCKIT Vilnius, Invest Lithuania, the Minister of Economy and Innovation and eight Lithuanian companies will participate in Money20/20/20, an international exhibition in Amsterdam on June 4-6. This event brings together thousands of industry members from around the world. “We have accumulated extensive experience in developing national displays at international exhibitions. We use this platform not only to showcase companies, but also to communicate Lithuania’s economic potential internationally. This includes highlighting business opportunities, spreading key messages about our market and fostering global partnerships. This approach undoubtedly helps attract attention and enables the companies at our booth to establish valuable contacts, which can later evolve into partnerships” says Simona Buziliauskieneė, Head of the Market Development division at the Innovation Agency Lithuania | Global Read the full article here 👉 https://lnkd.in/dNYaAEX3 Ondato European Merchant Bank | EMBank Liudas Kanapienis DeRISK Business Solutions Baltic Amadeus Noviti Finance ConnectPay Paysera Sarp Demiray Kamile Mazrime Lina Žemaitytė - Kirkman Dilek Işık Ingrida Eidukonytė

Fintech Valley Europe is the way forward! 🚀 It's not just about competition, but also about collaboration. 🤝 On November 18th, we participated in a significant Fintech conference in Warsaw during Warsaw Finance Week. Here’s a brief summary from one of the discussion panels we attended. Chris Crespo (moderator, Nordic Fintech Magazine) asked: "How are different fintech ecosystems doing? How do they collaborate and compete with each other?" Kamila Borkowska (PL Poland, Director, Business Development-Fintech, Mastercard) emphasized that great collaboration has brought many positive benefits, united us, exchanged ideas, and brought common positions on regulations. Competition is important as it evaluates the entire fintech sector. We should not fear competition but set cooperation levels to benefit from the market. Ian Kalla (EE Estonia, Head of Fintech, FinanceEstonia) and @MartinWikSætre (NO Norway, CEO, Quantfolio; Board Member, NCE Finance Innovation) agreed on the importance of cooperation between countries and associations. Ian added that cross-ecosystem collaboration is about building bridges, a core value for associations wanting to collaborate internationally. Chris asked about conflicts between local ecosystem goals and international business goals. Martin from Norway responded that he does not believe in protectionism and that strong cross-border cooperation is the right direction. Kamila emphasized that strong cooperation is good for client growth and speeding up processes. Ian agreed, adding that building walls around ourselves will make us lose business. Matěj Novák (CZ Czech Republic, Board Member, Czech Fintech Association; EasyChange cz) talked about effective cooperation and money exchange opportunities. Branislav Slobodník (SK Slovakia, Research Project Manager, FINAS - Fintech and Insurtech Association Slovakia) emphasized that positive competition is important and entering markets like Estonia and Norway can be beneficial. Braňo added: "In Slovakia, I would say that it is not competition, it is positive competition. Entering the Estonian and Norwegian markets is better because people there have knowledge, capacities, and you can save costs and speed up time." Kamila added that we should look at other ecosystems like Estonia and learn from each other. Martin from Norway agreed, emphasizing that well-functioning cooperation between countries can achieve great things. In this discussion, there was a consensus from different parts of Europe that uniting in our sector makes great sense for each of us. For these reasons, we are founding the Fintech Valley Europe association to promote European interests and support cross-border cooperation. Thank you to Braňo Slobodník for presenting FINAS - Fintech and Insurtech Association Slovakia and the initiative of uniting Fintech Valley Europe.

🇺🇦🤝🌎 Uniting Ukraine’s IT sector and global business: launching CodeUA, the marketplace for Ukrainian tech companies CodeUA will become a platform for effective cooperation between Ukrainian IT companies and global businesses looking for a reliable partner to implement technology projects. The platform will automatically select the best contractor for orders from international IT businesses. CodeUA is also: 🤝🏻 win-win cooperation. As a result, Ukrainian companies will find it easier to find new customers. Global businesses will get reliable executors of their technology projects 💻 global promotion of the Ukrainian tech sector. The platform will unite verified Ukrainian IT companies with a perfect reputation and strong expertise in all possible niches 🦾 a powerful boost in the development of the Ukrainian digital economy. The platform will make Ukraine a powerful exporter of IT services and high-quality services. Ukrainian code is already everywhere - from virtual reality and AI solutions to software for the world's automotive leaders. Despite all the challenges of the war, our IT companies continue to cooperate with top international brands such as Amazon, Apple, IBM, Cisco, Google, and many others. Ukrainian IT companies have become ambassadors of the Ukrainian code. Learn more and register on the official project website — https://codeua.com. Developing Ukraine's brand in the world as a high-tech country and scaling the digital economy 🇺🇦 The CodeUA platform was created jointly by the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine and the Lviv IT Cluster with the support of the USAID Competitive Economy Program in Ukraine (USAID CEP).

Next week, the Saudi-Swiss Fintech Forum 🇸🇦 🇨🇭 will take place in Riyadh. I am looking forward to see the outcomes of this highly anticipated event! The Saudi Vision 2030 aims to make a strong push for the development of the Saudi financial sector, which includes the advancement of Fintech's across the Kingdom. The KSA 🇸🇦 has the strong advantage, that unlike Switzerland 🇨🇭 , it is less burdened with legacy banking systems. Therefore, there are fewer obstacles to overcome for Saudi Fintech's to develop the next generation of financial infrastructure. We see this advantage play out especially in the area of digital payments, where the Saudi Fintech ecosystem is highly evolved. This will be especially interesting and insightful to our Swiss delegation visiting Riyadh next week! Meanwhile, with the Saudi economy growing 6.7% per year (CAGR 2009 - 2023), more people in the Kingdom have grown wealthy. This creates the need for new digital wealth management products. Switzerland is home to a range of advanced wealth management Fintech's which I would thus expect to be particularly of interest to our Saudi participants. In summary, I believe that the Saudi-Swiss Fintech Forum will be an exciting event for both the Saudi and Swiss Fintech industry, with both parties bringing unique and complementary strengths to the table! If you wish to learn more about the wide range of Fintech capabilities in Saudi Arabia, I may wholeheartedly recommend to have look at Fintech Saudi | فنتك السعودية (https://fintechsaudi.com/). Likewise, if you desire to learn more about the exciting Swiss Fintech industry, I may recommend to you the "Fintech: Future of Finance" report by Switzerland Global Enterprise or check out the Swiss Fintech map (https://fintechmap.ch/) by e.foresight - Banking Trendscout by Swisscom .

As featured in Nordic Fintech Magazine, Lithuania's fintech sector stands out with over 270 companies, ranking tenth globally in market size. 🌍 Lithuania is a recognized fintech hub with a supportive regulatory environment and a highly skilled workforce. 💡 As EMBank CEO Sarp Demiray notes, "Lithuania’s ongoing investment in the fintech industry development has undoubtedly yielded positive results, evident from the increasing number of licensed entities and the ecosystem’s global standing." This vibrant ecosystem attracts numerous startups and investors, further solidified by Lithuanian firms' participation in international events, including Money20/20 in Amsterdam, promoting global partnerships and showcasing the nation's economic potential. 🚀 #embank #europeanmerchantbank #money2020

Fintech Valley Europe is the way forward! 🚀 It's not just about competition, but also about collaboration. 🤝 On November 18th, we participated in a significant Fintech conference in Warsaw during Warsaw Finance Week. Here’s a brief summary from one of the discussion panels we attended. Chris C. (moderator, Nordic Fintech Magazine) asked: "How are different fintech ecosystems doing? How do they collaborate and compete with each other?" Kamila Borkowska (PL Poland, Director, Business Development-Fintech, Mastercard) emphasized that great collaboration has brought many positive benefits, united us, exchanged ideas, and brought common positions on regulations. Competition is important as it evaluates the entire fintech sector. We should not fear competition but set cooperation levels to benefit from the market. Ian Kalla (EE Estonia, Head of Fintech, FinanceEstonia) and @MartinWikSætre (NO Norway, CEO, Quantfolio; Board Member, NCE Finance Innovation) agreed on the importance of cooperation between countries and associations. Ian added that cross-ecosystem collaboration is about building bridges, a core value for associations wanting to collaborate internationally. Chris asked about conflicts between local ecosystem goals and international business goals. Martin from Norway responded that he does not believe in protectionism and that strong cross-border cooperation is the right direction. Kamila emphasized that strong cooperation is good for client growth and speeding up processes. Ian agreed, adding that building walls around ourselves will make us lose business. Matěj Novák (CZ Czech Republic, Board Member, Czech Fintech Association; EasyChange.cz) talked about effective cooperation and money exchange opportunities. Branislav Slobodník (SK Slovakia, Research Project Manager, FINAS - Fintech and Insurtech Association Slovakia) emphasized that positive competition is important and entering markets like Estonia and Norway can be beneficial. Braňo added: "In Slovakia, I would say that it is not competition, it is positive competition. Entering the Estonian and Norwegian markets is better because people there have knowledge, capacities, and you can save costs and speed up time." Kamila added that we should look at other ecosystems like Estonia and learn from each other. Martin from Norway agreed, emphasizing that well-functioning cooperation between countries can achieve great things. In this discussion, there was a consensus from different parts of Europe that uniting in our sector makes great sense for each of us. For these reasons, we are founding the Fintech Valley Europe association to promote European interests and support cross-border cooperation. Thank you to Braňo Slobodník for presenting FINAS - Fintech and Insurtech Association Slovakia and the initiative of uniting Fintech Valley Europe. #WarsawFinanceWeek #FintechValleyEurope #finas #fintech #leaders #Poland #Estonia #Nordic #CzechRepublic #SlovakRepublic

Thank you John Ruffolo and Matthew da Mota, Ph.D. for sharing. As per comments below, this is an excellent summary on innovation strategy at the national level; and, it highlights a disturbing politicized government agenda which appears to be focused on anything but economic stability. Recent calls to action from cross sector business leaders and from the Bank of Canada highlighting material gaps in reliable data, interpretation and risk-opportunity timing assumptions. This is not a matter for PR led policy and partisan politics. Commercialization and scale up These are specific and complex areas and Canada is behind and struggling...especially during Series "A"+. and/or late stage venture cap phased initiatives (typically post intellectual property identification). Competition for resources, talent and policy are global matters. Productivity In these phases and far beyond, is not a buzzword or a basket definition to be manipulated or spun—it’s the cornerstone of economic growth, job creation, and prosperity. And, it’s crucial to understand that productivity is not a partisan issue but rather a national imperative that benefits all Canadians. Global Competitiveness According to the OECD, Canada has falled behind other advanced economies due to slow productivity growth. Without strong productivity, our global standing and ability to attract investment and talent will weaken, leaving future generations at a disadvantage. Without competitiveness all the rate changes in the world will merely create a rebound of inflationary pressure that undermines purchasing power. Innovation and Infrastructure Lack of focus on technological investment and commercializing innovation has left us vulnerable. To remain competitive in the digital age, we need a national strategy that integrates infrastructure development and innovation across sectors. It’s about securing our economic future. Economic Stability Productivity is tied to our broader economic resilience. Without it, government interventions to prop up the economy—such as the Bank of Canada’s recent rate cuts—weakening our currency and long-term stability and making a rebound (or sustained) recession more likely. Regardless of your political view, monetary stability is something Canadians can and should agree on. Non-Partisan Call to Action Canada needs policies that encourage innovation, support business growth, and remove unnecessary regulatory burden. Whether it’s through public-private partnerships or investments in emerging technologies, this issue transcends political boundaries. Productivity is about creating a better future for all Canadians. It's difficult to create stability when in survival mode: economic prosperity and innovation ensures that Canada’s productivity is a top priority for every leader, regardless of sector or political party agenda or need for lame sound bites. #EconomicGrowth #Productivity #Innovation #NonPartisan #CanadaEconomy #Infrastructure #MonetaryPolicy

🌍 The launch of the FinTech Bridge platform underscores the urgency of bridging fragmented FinTech ecosystems, such as those between Italy and Singapore. This initiative represents more than just connectivity; it opens the door for startups to tap into new markets, enhance their global presence, and foster innovation across borders. From an Innovation Management perspective, this type of platform addresses critical bottlenecks in market access and collaboration, providing startups with the financial and strategic support they need to thrive in competitive landscapes. 🤔 What strategies best support cross-border collaboration and market expansion for FinTech companies in today's dynamic environment? 🔍 A robust approach involves leveraging strategic partnerships, like those seen in this platform's collaboration with AssoFintech and the Italian Trade Agency, to provide startups with access to critical infrastructure and support. Employing agile frameworks can also enable startups to adapt swiftly to market changes and regulatory environments. Furthermore, the integration of advanced technologies, like AI-driven analytics, can help these companies better understand market trends and consumer needs, positioning them for sustainable growth. #FinTechInnovation #CrossBorderCollaboration #StartupSuccess #DigitalTransformation #ValueInnovation §732