400 Swedish and U.S. business leaders gathered for SACC-USA’s Entrepreneurial Days in San Diego, Los Angeles, and Washington

 April 13, 2008, Alexandria, VA.

Sustainable Energy, Wireless/Telecom and Life Sciences were some of the industries that were in focus at the first Swedish-American Entrepreneurial Days (Edays) of 2008. The Edays are organized by the Swedish-American Chambers of Commerce and its 19 regional chambers across the U.S. The first 2008 Edays event was held in partnership with SACC San Diego April 7 – 9 and was preceded by a program at the House of Sweden in Washington DC April 3–4 discussing US business opportunities in renewable energy for Swedish companies and followed by a focus on the Media & Entertainment industry in Los Angeles.

“The United States has a lot to offer,” stated Jonas Hafström, Ambassador of Sweden to the United States in his opening remarks in San Diego. “Because of Sweden’s cutting edge hi-tech products, the U.S. is the place where great ideas and new products can grow, finding the financial support needed to accelerate on the market,” continued Ambassador Hafström.

More than 500 pre-scheduled business matchmaking meetings took place during the San Diego Edays. “Our business idea is a web based biometric facial recognition service, which is interesting for large social networks sites like Facebook and Myspace,” explained Babak Goudarzi-Pour, CEO for Optimum Biometric Labs, Karlskrona, Sweden. “The next step for us is to find venture capital so that we can expand our business to the U.S., where many of our prospective customers are. Through SACC-USA’s matchmaking program at the Edays I actually just met with an American investor who was thrilled to hear more about our ideas,” said Goudarzi-Pour. 

With business matchmaking in focus, the Edays has become the biggest event of its kind, providing a platform for companies of all sizes to meet. In total more than 400 Swedish and American business- and government leaders gathered in Washington DC, San Diego and Los Angeles to further trade, commerce and investment across the Atlantic. The delegation from Sweden consisted of more than 100 people and 21 different U.S. states were represented. This spring’s Edays program was organized by SACC-USA and SACC San Diego together with all the regional chambers in close collaboration with the Embassy of Sweden, the Swedish Consulate General in New York and Los Angeles, Connect, Biocom, Commnexus and NanoBioNexus.

“We are thrilled to see that so many strong business relations have been initiated at our Edays which we have organized in Sweden and the U.S. since 1997,” Wahlstedt continues. The next Entrepreneurial Days will take place in Stockholm September 14–16 continuing on the theme of accelerating trade and commerce between Sweden and the U.S. offering industry ‘deep dives’ in Telecom, Clean Tech and Investment.

Upper picture: Ambassador Jonas Hafstrom, Ambassador of Sweden to he United States
Lower picture: Viveka Wahlstedt, Chairman , SACC-USA, and Mike T. Davis, Scandia-Germania-Davis Law Firm