Our final destination on the EURO 2012 FDI tour is Lviv, situated in Western Ukraine, 70 kilometres from the border with Poland.

Known as the “Little Paris of Ukraine” Lviv is an important cultural and tourist destination.  Its historic city centre is on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

It is a major centre of education, with 38 higher education institutions and 130,000 students.  The city has a population of 760,000 (with 1.5 million people in the wider metropolitan area).

With its marketing headline “Open to the World”, it is indeed attractive to overseas companies, with 581 foreign-owned companies operating in the city.  A priority sector for Lviv is the attraction of BPO and Shared Services Centre operations.  It has been included in KPMG’s Global Frontiers report looking at 31 emerging destinations for IT-BPO activities.

We have fond memories of our visit to Lviv. It is where we met Vasili Abaimov, a former mayor who puts the fun into FDI, and who does much to encourage cross-border relationships - a great ambassador for Ukraine!

During EURO 2012, Lviv will be hosting three of the Group B matches between The Netherlands,  Denmark, Germany, and Portugal.

The next stop on the EURO 2012 FDI tour is Gdansk, Poland’s largest seaport on the Baltic Sea, and the birthplace of the world renowned Solidarity trade union movement - born on August 31, 1980.

As well as a major transport hub, Gdansk is also a popular tourist destination and a growing centre for information technology.  Its airport - the Gdansk Lech Walesa Airport - has just had a second terminal built, and further expansion plans over the next two years are going to triple traffic to this fast growing airport.

The seaport has a Deepwater Container Terminal with direct container lines to the Asian market.  Another important piece of infrastructure for the city is the PGE Arena Gdansk where the EURO 2012 football will be played.

The city is marketed as part of the Tri-City area, comprising the cities of Gdansk, Gdynia, and Sopot, which are all close together and have a combined population of 730,000 people.

During EURO 2012 it will be hosting three of the Group C matches between Spain, Italy, Republic of Ireland and Croatia.  It will also be hosting one of the quarter finals.

Last week we were in Tbilisi, Georgia - awesome hospitality, great people, and an amazing “go for it” attitude .  People make the place, and Tbilisi is now on our list of FDI places to watch out for.  More stories on this happening location soon…

Another exciting FDI city taking part in hosting EURO 2012 is Kharkiv in the north east of Ukraine.  It is the second largest city in the Ukraine, with a population of around 1.5 million people.

It is a major manufacturing centre, primarily in machinery production, making turbines, tanks (the legendary T34 tank was designed here), harvesters, aircraft, and space control systems. It has 13 universities and over 150,000 students. It has 26,000 research scientists active in various research institutions including the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology, the Institute of Metrology, and the Institute of Experimental and Clinical Veterinary Medicine.  The city has produced 4 nobel prize winners to date.

We have met the city’s Deputy Mayor, Igor Terekhov who is a great character and super networker, just like the city itself, which is twinned with more than 20 cities across the world.

It is a football mad city, and during EURO 2012 it will be hosting three of the Group B matches between the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany and Portugal.

This summer, football is going to bring some interesting FDI locations in to the spotlight.  UEFA EURO 2012 kicks off on 8th June, and four cities in Poland and four cities in Ukraine will be hosting what is ranked as one of the world’s top three sporting events.

One of the FDI stars is Wroclaw, a city in the south west of Poland which is actually nearer to Prague and Berlin than it is to Warsaw.  With a metro population of around a million people, it is one of the top tech locations in Poland, particularly for ICT, and it is also a favoured location for BPO and shared services activities. It has a strong academic base with 27 higher education institutions and 146,000 students.  It has provided the world with 10 Nobel Prize winners.  It has a pro-active, high profile Mayor, and the Wroclaw Agglomeration Development Agency is an effective support agency for overseas investors.

During EURO 2012 it will be hosting three of the Group A matches between Poland, Greece, Russia and the Czech Republic.

Extremely useful work being undertaken by Startup Genome, a collaborative research project looking at what makes tech start-ups successful.  One of the outputs of this has been an in-depth look at the various tech ecosystems across the world, and a ranking of the Top 25 Tech Locations:

1. Silicon Valley (San Francisco, Palo Alto, San Jose, Oakland)

2. New York City (NYC & Brooklyn)

3. London

4. Toronto

5. Tel Aviv

6. Los Angeles

7. Singapore

8. Sao Paulo

9. Bangalore

10. Moscow

11. Paris

12. Santiago

13. Seattle

14. Madrid

15. Chicago

16. Vancouver

17. Berlin

18. Boston

19. Austin

20. Mumbai

21. Sydney

22. Melbourne

23. Warsaw

24. Washington D.C.

25. Montreal

Is a very interesting list indeed!

Well done to James Cogan and his colleagues for their Invest In Rome project.  Taking the initiative to help bring more FDI jobs to Rome and Lazio, they are setting up an FDI promotion organisation to put Rome more firmly on the FDI map.

They are currently crowdfunding for resources and are planning to deliver a transparent and inclusive organisation that will use all the wonderful digital marketing and relationship tools available to us today.

It is great to see such an initiative which adds to the current FDI landscape.  These times call for new ways of doing things. Buona fortuna to Invest In Rome!

The Irish Government’s Action Plan for Jobs 2012 is a very clear and integrated call to action for Ireland.  It helps to demonstrate that the country has a plan for its future economic development - it knows what it wants and it is going out to the global marketplace to get it.

One initiative that has come out of this is ConnectIreland a call to the world to help create jobs in Ireland.  It is a global referral programme encouraging people to make introductions to the decision-makers in internationally expanding companies.  It offers a reward for jobs created (a minimum of €1,500 per job created, to a maximum of 100 jobs) and it is drawing on the massive reach and clout of the Irish diaspora.  Ireland is currently performing very well in attracting FDI, and it will be interesting to see how this smart initiative can help to further boost job creation.

We have had the pleasure to work with Kevin Moore of Business Therapies, who last year was awarded an OBE and this year received the Outstanding Contribution to the Growth of the Scottish Life Sciences at the Scottish Enterprise Life Sciences Awards.  In chatting to him, his passion for both the life sciences and for Scotland is clearly evident.

Q: Can you give us a brief overview of the life sciences sector in Scotland?

A: The life sciences sector in Scotland is both exciting and challenging.  Scotland aims to double its Gross Value Added from life sciences in the next 10 years and I see no reason why we should not achieve that growth.  Of course we are going to have some major challenges such as getting suitable cornerstone funding in place, but that is what business is all about.  We have some really exciting R&D being undertaken by our world-class academic researchers and what has really impressed me in the last 5 years or so is that they now understand the importance of converting it into commercial reality.

Q: Why do you think the life sciences have such a significant presence in Scotland?

A: We really do have world-class life science research in Scotland and it gives me great pleasure to see academia, Scottish companies (especially SMEs) and Scottish Enterprise working together to maximise the opportunities to achieve commercialisation.  We can compete on the world stage by investing in high quality life science products by anchoring our businesses through our linkages.  We are at long last understanding the importance of win-win.

Q: What areas within Scotland’s life sciences sector could be classed as genuine world-class?

A: The logical answer would be areas such as regenerative medicine and stem cells, but don’t underestimate the exciting work and opportunities being developed in medical devices and medical technologies including diagnostics.  We have some phenomenal developments happening in this space.

Q: How do you see the life sciences performing in Scotland over the next few years?

A: I am more excited about what we can do in life sciences in Scotland than I have ever been in my 40 years in the industry - so much so, retirement is furthest from my mind as there is too much fun!!!  The Scottish Government and Scottish Enterprise have really tried to be supportive of our industry but they have many calls on their resources.  We need a fit for purpose financial infrastructure to support the growth of our companies because while our angel community has been great over the last 10 years, they really are not the ideal investors for many of our life sciences opportunities.

Q: If you were promoting Scotland to attract overseas life sciences companies, what would be your headline selling message?

A: Come to Scotland because we will work with you to achieve your business aspirations.

Top marks to New York City with its #loveNYC photo contest on its Facebook page.  Keeping it typically New York hip it asks users of Instagram and Hipstamatic to take photos of things in the city that show off their love for the Big Apple. Using a mix of social media and trendy apps helps to demonstrate New York’s place in the cool crowd, and connect directly with the huge army of smartphone photo snappers.  The world has gone visual and places need to tap in to this trend.