TAIWAN Business.EU l institucions l agencies

nanotechnology, to name just a few. The

Czech government recently approved the

country’s brand-new Innovation strategy until

2030 under the slogan “The Czech Republic:

the Country for the Future”, which seeks to

enhance the local environment in the fields of

new technology, R&D, innovation and

education to meet the requirements of

demanding R&D and high-value-added

projects of both Czech and foreign companies and R&D institutions. CzechInvest is also

placing more emphasis on attracting and

assisting high-tech projects benefiting from

the country’s high level of technological

development and its long industrial and

educational tradition. A lot has already been

done, for example in the field of artificial

intelligence, in which the Czech Republic is

ranked among the top countries in Europe

and Czech R&D institutions and companies

have much to offer within AI research and

implementation. Therefore, the Czech

Republic is planning to apply for establishing

one of the European AI Centres of Excellence.

How do you perceive Czech investment in

Taiwan? What role could CzechInvest

have in the area to support Czech

enterprises?

First of all, CzechInvest has 14 regional offices

that can provide export consultancy to

Czech companies on behalf of the CzechTrade agency. I can see a lot of opportunities for

Czech investors in both traditionally strong

areas of Czech industry like automobiles and

electrical systems, as well as a luxury cosmetics, crystal and designer products.

Škoda Auto, Moser or Botanicus are all well

established in Taiwan. Also, the area of

advanced engineering is still very important.

On 1 January 2017, the world's leading

machine-tool manufacturer, TOS Varnsdorf

a.s., merged with the Taiwanese company

Litz Hightech Corp. and established a joint

Mgr. Petr Heczko, M.A.

Director of the Foreign

Activities Division

venture called TOS LITZ Machinery Corporation. The joint venture produces unique

drilling machines, which are mainly targeted

at the Chinese market, as well as Malaysia or

Thailand.

I personally also see a lot of opportunities for

the Czech companies in modern areas like

cybersecurity, environmental protection,

smart city technologies to name a few.

Could you please name a few areas of

cooperation between CzechInvest and

Taiwanese institutions?

Our priority is of course to cater for Czech

and foreign companies. As for the CzechInvest participation in Taiwan, CzechInvest

actively helped to organise the participation

of a delegation of Czech companies in the

Secutech exhibition in April last year and also

actively participated in the Smart City summit

this year. All these activities were organized

jointly with the Czech Economic and Cultural

Office in Taiwan.

CzechInvest continuously cooperates with

TECO, the Taipei Economic and Cultural

Office in Prague, to identify fields of potential

economic cooperation, e.g. within the

automotive industry, electronics and R&D.

Through TECO we also got in touch with

TAITRA, Taiwan External Trade Development

Council, or ITRI, Industrial Technology

Research Institute to exchange information

about business opportunities and the newest

industrial technology developments.

Last but not least, apart from assisting foreign

companies in setting up their operations in

the Czech Republic, CzechInvest is also very

active in supporting the subsequent growth

of Czech start-ups and SMEs on both the

Czech and foreign markets. We send local

start-ups abroad to selected business incubators to help them establish contacts, penetrate new markets and scale up their business

abroad. So it is no surprise that the topic of

start-ups has also been discussed with TECO

with the aim of interconnecting the Czech

and Taiwanese start-up ecosystems.

Could you please tell a little bit more

about the start-up ecosystem in the Czech

Republic?

Within the CEE region, the Czech Republic is

at the forefront of the start-up ecosystem. The

Czech start-up scene has a dynamic growth

and entrepreneurial spirit even if it is still in its

primary stage. The “big boom” started in

2010 when first incubators and accelerators

were established and first investments in

start-up companies were recognized. The

greatest concentration is in large cities

Prague, Brno, Ostrava.

Start-ups are predominantly conducting

business in the sectors such as SaaS, Web

Services and Mobile Software Services,

Analytics / Business Intelligence and Cloud

Services. One of the most highly developed

segments is security, where the Czech

Republic has a good foundation in the form

of globally known firms such as AVAST and

AVG. Currently, the Czech start-up ecosystem conglomerates around 2,000 companies. The number of start-ups is constantly

growing which could also be a good opportunity for Taiwanese investors or for Taiwanese start-ups to expand their business to the

Czech Republic. And CzechInvest is ready to

assist, for instance by organizing an incoming

mission to the Czech Republic on the occasion of the Startup World Cup Summit, the

biggest startup event in the whole CEE

region, planned for April 2020.

Thank you for interview.

foto: Startup World Cup & Summit

Petr graduated from the Faculty of Science at University of Ostrava and

completed his Eastern European Studies with a focus on intercultural

communication, European ethnology, Eastern European history and

economics at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich. He worked as

a project coordinator at the consulting and research agency MKW

Wirtschaftsforschung prior to starting at CzechInvest. He has been working at CzechInvest since 2011. He started out as an information and

marketing specialist, then worked as a territorial specialist for Scandinavia and worked his way up to position of DTitledirector of the Investment Development Department . He has been the Director of the Division of Foreign Activities since April 2018. Petr speaks English, German

and Swedish. He is married and has two children. He likes to spend his

free time with his family and enjoys travelling, cycling, reading and

learning languages.

www.taiwanbusiness.eu

3