8 May 2012

Europe Going Forward!  How can we strengthen Europe’s competitiveness?

BSCC and CCFS invited its members to an exciting lunch seminar at Ernst & Young with the British and the French Ambassadors to Sweden, H.E. Paul Johnston and H.E. Jean Pierre Lacroix and Oscar Wåglund Söderström, State Secretary to the Minister for EU-affairs, with Håkan Johnsson as moderator.

The panel discussion discussed mainly the issue whether or not a brake or an accelerator in the European cooperation was to strengthen Europe’s competitiveness.

Mr Wåglund said that an accelerator in helping other countries through the crises was to be preferred due to the fact that all countries are dependent on each other.

Both Ambassadors concur with the fact that EU countries are vital for their countries’ economy. H.E. Paul Johnston believed however that each country should take care of their own economy before helping others. Whereas the French Ambassador believes that “more EU” would result in a stronger France.

Thank you Ernst & Young for hosting this lovely and very interesting lunch!

18 April 2012

Britain, Great for Business in Gothenburg

BSCC in co-operation with UK Trade & Investment, West Sweden Chamber of Commerce, the British Embassy and SCC arranged a conference in Gothenburg at Clarion Post Hotel on Wednesday 18 April. The theme for the conference was to promote UK as an investment destination and business partner for Swedish companies. The event was to encourage the appe­tite of entrepreneurs in Gothenburg and west Sweden to establish new and expand existing business in the UK.

As the 18th of April marked 100 days to the opening of the Olympic Games, we had a panel discussion with Triple Jump Olympic Gold medallist Christian Ohlsson, Lisa Ericsson and Astrid Gabrielsson, competing in London 2012 sailing 470 class, Stefan Lindeberg, Chair of the Swedish Olympic Committee, Elisabeth Ström, Communication Director, Vattenfall and Peter Klock, CEO of GKSS discussing sponsorship and training. We also had a keynote speech on the business legacy of the Olympics with speaker Paul Woolston, Senior Partner of PWC in the North East and Chairman of the North East Local Enterprise Partnership

Other areas that were discussed were electricity and energy Markets with speaker Anders Dahl, Head Business Division Renewables, Vattenfall; Business climate, market opportunities and success factors in UK/Sweden, including practical guidance with speakers: Fredrik Häggström, Country Manager UK, Swedish Trade Council; Sapna Chadha, Head of Electronics, Communications & Financial Services, UKTI; Johan Trouvé, CEO, West Sweden Chamber of Commerce; and Caroline Theobald, Honorary Consul for Sweden, Chairman North East Chapter, Swedish Chamber of Commerce. These were followed by Case Studies from financial services we had speaker Pär Boman, CEO, Handelsbanken, property

Christel Armstrong, Stena Fastigheter. These speakers then had a paneldiscussion moderated by Britt-Marie Mattsson.

A full report will be presented in the next Newsletter.

Thank you everybody for a lovely day!