40th ICECE Work Group Meeting

Kiev, Ukraine
6 – 9 Oct 1999

Again a German—Russian Enterprise Cooperation Forum—the first one in Ukraine—was the framework for an ICECE/SPICE initiative. At this forum a German—Ukrainian Workshop on Business Incubation was organized and found greatest interest in the country. More than 70 participants from all over Ukraine, representing all kinds of incubators and projects as well as related and supporting organizations attended the workshop, the second event this year organized in cooperation between UBICA, the Ukrainian Business and Innovation Center Association, and the SPICE Group. With this event UBICA further developed acceptance as the national incubation organization. Part of the program was a short visit to the first innovation center operation in Ukraine: Belaya Tsherkhov (some 100 km from Kiev). The visitors found the center very interesting and learned much about the Ukrainian adaptations of the business incubation concept. It is an excellent example for the possibilities to help start-up companies getting off the ground in the difficult environment of the country.

With this workshop Igor Leleka took over responsibility as the Executive Director of the association. The "old fellows" gave him a warm welcome in the network and the coffee, lunch and dinner breaks were intensively used to develop the links. Krzysztof Zasiadly and Heinz Fiedler again helped getting things organized and bringing the right people together. As a result of all the meetings and discussions a number of concrete business ideas were collected—much work for the months to come.

Of course the social part of the meetings were enjoyable as well. From the conference receptions in historical places with national delicacies, dinners in historical restaurants with much local flavor (the music as well as the costumes of waitresses and waiters) to the dancing in the hot night spots of Kiev. As usual these parts of the event contributed significantly to making the personals links more intensive.

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