Ambassador Lars Gert Lose welcomed the members to the annual meeting at the Residence on December 14th. The Ambassador also welcomed the guest speaker, Stephen Brugger of AmCham. As already outlined in his greeting, he then turned to his priorities and how ADBC fits within those priorities. It is important to grow the organization and bring more value in terms of networking opportunities and engagement with US stakeholders and decision makers as well as visiting Danish VIPs.
With the transition to the new Secretariat headed by the Head of Trade and the sector experts within her team, ADBC will be more integrated into the work of the Embassy and the Trade Council. Also, the Deputy Chief of Mission, Lars Bo Møller, and the head of Economic Diplomacy, Niels Heltberg, will be more involved and integrated into the work of ADBC. Morten Cass Skrøjer will remain responsible for outreach to Congress/Congressional Friends of Denmark Caucus and members of the Administration.
Niels Heltberg briefed the members on the organization around the Economic Growth Council. The graph below gives a simple explanation of the structure.
Lina Gandløse Hansen then explained how the Secretariat would operate as of January 1st. She presented an event calendar for 2016 and introduced her team members.
She also presented a three tiered event sponsorship package.
Stephen Brugger then took the podium to present AmCham and the Transatlantic Company of the Year award. AmCham was founded in 1999 and has grown from 50 members in the early years to 250 members today. He described the different phases of growth from the initial phase centered on more social events, like Thanksgiving, to now a more ambitious focus – that is, the thought leader of choice and the voice of international business in Denmark.
One major effort, the White Paper on multinational investments in Denmark, demonstrated that while investment is stagnant, foreign owned companies are responsible for some 20 percent of jobs. This was a major wake-up call to the Danish government in terms of realizing the importance and the impact of foreign investment.
More information is available in this newsletter on the Transatlantic Company of the Year award. Furthermore the presentation for this years Annual meeting can be viewed at the end of the article.
The meeting concluded with all being invited to stay for the DC Sustainability reception and the concert by SMUK.
ADBC presentation Annual Meeting
