Connecting business, academia and policy.
Speakers
Peter Stano
EUROPEAN COMMISSION REPRESENTATION IN SLOVAKIA
Head of representation
He is originally from Martin and graduated from the Faculty of Arts at Comenius University in Bratislava, where he studied Journalism. From 1994 to 2009, he worked in the media, including Slovak Radio in Bratislava, Deutsche Welle in Cologne and London, the BBC World Service in London, and Slovak Television in Bratislava, as a foreign affairs editor and moderator. In 2008, he worked as a freelance journalist in Damascus, Syria.
From 2009, he worked at the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic, serving in the Minister’s Office as spokesperson during two terms, and later as Special Envoy for Migration. He was posted to the Permanent Representation of the Slovak Republic to the EU in Brussels and to the Embassy of the Slovak Republic in Beirut, with responsibility for Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.
He worked at the European Commission twice as the first, and to date only, Slovak citizen to serve as a spokesperson — first for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy (2011–2014), and later as spokesperson for the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (2019–2024).
He speaks German, English, Spanish, French and Croatian, and has conversational proficiency in Russian and Arabic.
VLADIMÍR ŠIMOŇÁK
MINISTRY OF ECONOMY
State Secretary
Vladimír Šimoňák is State Secretary at the Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic, specialising in international relations, European affairs and industrial policy.
His professional career spans more than 15 years in public administration. He gained extensive experience at the Ministry of the Interior of the Slovak Republic (2008–2021), where he headed the Department of Foreign Affairs and European Affairs and, from 2015 to 2021, led the Internal Affairs Division at the Permanent Representation of the Slovak Republic to the EU in Brussels.
From 2021 to 2023, he served at the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of the Slovak Republic as Director of the Crisis Management Department.
He is a graduate of Matej Bel University, where he obtained a Master’s degree in Law and a PhD in International Relations.
MONIKA NAĎOVÁ KROŠLÁKOVÁ
BUSINESS ALLIANCE OF SLOVAKIA
President
Monika Naďová Krošláková is an Associate Professor and a member of the Academic Senate at the Faculty of Commerce of the University of Economics in Bratislava. She is President of the Business Alliance of Slovakia, founder of the Family Business Center, and co-founder of the Network of Top Business Leaders and Researchers at the International Business and Economic Research Academy (IBERA).
She serves as a member of the International Advisory Council at the Institute of One World Leadership®. She is also a member of the Wisdom Board of the Family Hippocampus Club, the International Council of Experts at the Family Business Institute (IRB), and the Advisory Council at Asiatech Education.
She is the academic coordinator for the Family Business and Entrepreneurship courses and co-coordinates three study programmes, including a PhD programme, at the Faculty of Commerce of the University of Economics in Bratislava.
She is co-owner of the family manufacturing company Novplasta s.r.o. (second generation) and the consulting company Excellence Consulting s.r.o. (first generation). In the field of family business, she works as an expert at the Slovak Business Agency and is a member of a working group at the Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic dedicated to family business issues.
Filip Franek
AMAZON
Public Policy Manager for the Czech Republic and Slovakia
Filip Franek serves as Manager for External Relations for the Czech Republic and Slovakia at Amazon, where he is responsible for operations, sustainability, and support for small and medium-sized enterprises. Before joining Amazon in 2022, he gained extensive experience in various positions at the British Chamber of Commerce and the British Embassy in Prague, where he led teams focused on delivering business services and supporting entrepreneurs.
