Ingrida Karina-Berzina was elected as the Chair of the Board and President of AmCham Latvia for 2019-2020 at the Board meeting on March 26. She is the first female President of the Chamber. Liene Dubava, Zinta Jansons, George Miu and Pauls Miklasevics were elected as Vice Presidents for the next year. Congratulations to the new officers!

During a joint conference experts offered their take on how to get ready for the new Whistleblowers Law, which takes effect on May 1, 2019, and will require companies employing over 50 people to introduce certain whistleblowing mechanisms. Presentations and full video of the conference are available.

AmCham in cooperation with the Latvian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Latvian American Chamber of Commerce held the 7th Seminar in Gateway to the USA program exploring the topics of Healthy living, Food and Technologies. Watch the video below!

With over 75 participants our 26th Annual General Meeting was a great success. Members met to review the past year’s activities and elect the Board of Directors, which now consists of: Zinta Jansons, Partner at Ellex Klavins; Roberts Melbardis, Country Manager, Operations Director of Encompass Digital Media; Pauls Miklasevics, Individual member and Ieva Racenaja, Director of Riga Graduate School of Law. We would like to thank our previous President Arnis Kakulis and Vice President Janis Meija for their service and wish them best of luck in their future endeavors!

AmCham members had a unique opportunity to meet FBI special agents for an exclusive seminar exlporing the topic of cyber security. The workshop was very insightful and practical from exploring challenges brought by insider threats to case studies about high-tech organized crime, e-mail compromise scams, money laundering and financial frauds. As a result of the workshop, Overseas Security Advisary Council will be launched in Latvia in order to provide a forum for effective communication between the U.S. Embassy and the private sector.

AmCham members met to discuss the improvements required in the Healthcare system of Latvia, including promoting efficiency, transparency and digitalization. The next meeting is scheduled for April 26. Please contact the AmCham office if you would like to participate in this work group!

Anatomy Next won the Latvian-American Innovation Award 2019 for their virtual reality training system Trauma Simulator that allows medical students to practice and improve their performance in emergency situations. Functional structure of textile, containing metamaterial created by Dr.sc.ing. Inga Lasenko, was announced as a runner-up. The winner received 10,000 Euro and the runner-up 5,000 Euro and a custom made award. Honorable mentions were presented to mindful communication app Asya and Virutal OP Hub.

Ieva Jaunzeme, the new Head of State Revenue Service (SRS) shared her ambitious plans for the future strategic development of SRS that include digitalization and improvement of Latvia's tax system in order to tackle shadow economy.

Please welcome new Corporate Contributing member of our growing network – SAF Tehnika! SAF Tehnika is a microwave data transmission equipment manufacturer with a global presence in over 130 countries.

BITE Latvija, the fastest growing mobile operator in Latvia that for more than ten years has been providing Latvians with modern and innovative mobile services, joins the Chamber as a Corporate member.

Please welcome our new Corporate member, an information technology company DYNATECH to the Chamber. Founded in 2013, DYNATECH has been creating flexible, innovative and efficient IT solutions

Bezvests.lv, the only volunteer organization providing missing persons search in Latvia territory since 2009, has joined the Chamber as a Non-Profit member. They have found 108 persons in 800 search operations.

Ellex was awarded “Baltics & Eastern Europe Firm of the Year 2019” at the Managing IP EMEA Awards 2019 ceremony in London on 7 March. This award is presented to firms, individuals and companies behind the most innovative and challenging intellectual property work of the past year. Congratulations to Ellex!

The 6th Annual Human Development Award, created to honor inspirational people, businesses and organizations of Latvia, is open for applications by May 31 in 4 categories: Social Responsibility, Outstanding Commitment to Education, Exemplary Contribution to Health and Well-Being and The Future of Latvia. The application form is available here. The Awards Ceremony will take place on September 19.

FICIL elected a new Executive Board on March 19: Julia Sundberg, Fortum; Ints Krasts, SEB; Baiba Apine, PwC and Arnis Sauka, SSE Riga. 4 Board members will continue their work as part of the FICIL Executive Board - Maris Gruznins, Cemex; Gunta Jekabsone, Circle K Latvia; Ingrida Karina-Berzina, AmCham and Baiba Zuzena, All Media Latvia. In addition, FICIL introduced the New Executive Director - Mārtiņš Panke who will take on the role as of April 1.

Have you already filled our survey on labor market and talent attraction? If not, we would very much appreciate your input helping us with this important research. Please contact our office to complete this survey by sending an e-mail to ieva.melngaile@amcham.lv

March 2019

Welcome to our next newsletter. The busy spring season has begun with seven events in March. This month the Chamber elected new leadership, co-hosted the Annual Latvian-American Innovation Award, held a seminar on the U.S. market and met the new Head of State Revenue Service. Just yesterday we had a chance to learn about the new Whistleblowers Law. As a special treat, our members were invited to an exclusive cyber security workshop with FBI.

Upcoming events

Apr 04, 2019

from 08:00 till 09:30

Apr 12, 2019

from 11:30 till 14:00

Apr 26, 2019

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Apr 30, 2019

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May 02, 2019

from 12:30 till 18:30

May 23, 2019 - May 24, 2019

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May 30, 2019 - May 31, 2019

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Sep 19, 2019

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