Dear AMCHAM members and friends,
Last week we were very fortunate to have two great events: a great lunch time event put on Diversity Committee at the Baker & McKenzie offices, spearheaded by Baker & McKenzie and PwC; the topic was the opportunity to beneficially use AI to enhance Diversity during recruitment an employee. Our distinguished speaker was Professor Kirk Chang from University of East London, a globally renowned expert with many years of research experience on this subject matter.
The lecture was followed by a very engaged walking brunch featuring terrific food and drinks provided by Oberweis under the sponsorship of Baker & McKenzie. Our thanks to Professor Chang, Baker & McKenzie and PwC for this great event! We are especially pleased that our Diversity committee has decided to incorporate the theme of this discussion into their agenda of activities and Professor Chang has agreed to return next year to do a follow up. So, please watch this space and be on the look out to join us next year.
Also last week we were very pleased to have partnered with Amazon to host a town hall panel discussion with the four biggest political parties competing in the Chamber of Deputies election of 8 October. This town hall was moderated by distinguished and highly experienced independent Director David Arendt and focused totally on business and economic issues. You will find below an article and photos from our friend and colleague Jazmin Campbell, G-Media Sárl’s CEO, below along with the AmCham-written article, photos and video. We want to point out that our event was the only purely business-focused event to be put on during this election period. We did this because we are concerned the government and politicians tend to take for granted and do not focus sufficient attention giving priority to business and economic issues. We consider this a big mistake since the reality is that Luxembourg needs a strong economy to fund the generous social initiatives and government programs many governmental officials and inhabitants of Luxembourg take for granted and consider their birth right. We were very pleased to welcome four very strong and influential political representatives of the CSV, DP, Green and LSAP political parties and compliment David Arendt for his exceptionally strong moderation ability. The conversations were very serious with heated engagements showing the differences of opinions among the political parties.
Please see and enjoy the two reports and sets of photos below and the link to the AmCham-produced video. Likewise, please know that we have started the planning for a post-election town hall meeting to continue our advocacy and discussion on business and economic issues.
Lastly, our big thanks for our enthusiastic crowd of attendees. It was very obvious during and after the event that we did the right thing by focusing on economic and business issues. Our enthusiastic and very high quality attendees were very seriously involved and would have continued for quite some time asking very high quality questions far beyond the time we had available to us for this event. Special thanks to Amazon for their amazing partnership and sponsorship of this event and their assumption of the Chairmanship of the newest AmCham committee on Government Relationship Management (GRMCOM). Persons with further interest in this committee and its activities are welcome to contact me personally at Paul@amcham.lu.
This week, our feature interview is with Ian McConnel, Chief Risk Officer and General Counsel, Americas at CSC corporation headquartered in the state of Delaware in the USA. CSC is a huge global corporation which last year purchased Intertrust, one of the biggest and most respected financial services company providers in Luxembourg. Next week he will be in Luxembourg for intensive meetings with key leaders in government and business here and I was very pleased that he was willing to share in advance his SWOT analysis perspectives on Luxembourg and compare my views with his independent judgements, which are published in this issue. He is a very strong leader and his insights are quite valuable. Please enjoy reading the interview. I am likewise pleased to point out that I have great respect and appreciation for the current and ongoing Luxembourg leadership team at Intertrust very wisely and strongly led by David Sarfas.
Internal to the AmCham team, I want to call out and compliment Jorge Rodriguez for his tireless efforts to support the Luxembourg retail sector ecosystem via our AmCham Member Benefits Program (AMBC). Every day, Jorge is on the phone talking with retailers for have joined AmCham as partners offering price discounts to the benefit of our AmCham member company employees and, in return, having their services and products promoted by AmCham on our website and in our Newsletter. It is tough being a retailer in Luxembourg and has been for some time. Since the Luxembourg economy is not strong if any part of it is weak, this MBC partnership is our not-for-profit activity to support the companies of the retail sector while at the same time allowing AMCHAM member company affiliated employees to get more value for their salary income! Please see the MBC content details later in this Newsletter or on our website of www.amcham.lu.
Like every week, we are thrilled to offer a delicious food recipe very generously offered to our readers by Bibi Wintersdorf coming from her magazine Kachen. She is a great gastronomy expert and a wonderful friend and colleague. We are very happy to have a wonderful ongoing partnership with her!!! Read and enjoy!!!
If you are an AmCham member already, thanks for your partnership and support! We love having you part of our family!!! Please feel free to tell your friends about us…. we would be happy for them to join as members too.
If you are reading this newsletter but are not a member, please contact us at: info@amcham.lu.
We will be very happy to do our best to convince you to join the largest and most active Chamber of Economy in Luxembourg…. all passports are most welcome!
With my respect and very best wishes,
Paul Schonenberg
Chairman and CEO
AMCHAM.lu
