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| Newsletter July 2011 | |||
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| Dear Members of the SME UNION, dear friends of SMEs! | |||
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Peter Jungen |
The careful readers among you will surely remember an article in the leading German daily “Handelsblatt”, issued on May 26th 2011, where I proposed to create the position of an additional Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), putting forward the name of Mr. Zhu Min, Deputy Governor of the People's Bank of China from 2009 to 2010.
This idea has now become reality after his appointment by Mrs. Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the IMF. I really welcome the decision to widen the IMF leadership with the inclusion of a high ranking representative of the Peoples Republic of China. This will surely change gradually the Fund’s attitude towards the European debt crisis by taking a more reluctant position. It is indeed evident how the IMF had outstretched its own rules in trying to bail out Greece by funding budget deficits which under the IMF statutes is not foreseen. Mr. Zhu Min will also offer new insights for the Fund as a representative of the fast growing Emerging Markets with China now being the second largest economy in the world. This will also be seen in the reversal of the position of the IMF versus the European debt crisis. To continue muddling through with the debt crisis is a no go for Europe. Since last week Greece is now officially insolvent if insolvency means that someone is not able to fully pay its debt. The next crisis will definitely come soon – maybe already in 3 months with the next payments due. The real problems of Greece and some other EU-countries are as I stated at the recent conference hosted by Nobel Laureate Prof. Robert Mundell that from the beginning on the Euro was only a purely political project and not an economic one. Europe is therefore now really in a “mess.” Indeed in the last 30 to 40 years the problems in Europe have created the debt problems in Europe. The Euro zone will pay now a price for not observing the economic principles governing an economic monetary union. I hope that with a notable delay of ten years Europe will now be able to start observing the economic guidelines which constitute the framework for an optimal currency region. The real problems of course in a country like Greece are structural. In the Global Competitiveness Index, in the Economic Freedom Index and in the Doing Business Report of the World Bank Greece ranks very poor: for instance in the Doing Business Report 2011 it comes on rank 109 behind Bangladesh. Therefore I insist on the concept that an effective renaissance of entrepreneurship culture is the key for the solution of Europe’s problems. Entrepreneurs, Founders, Start Ups and Business Angels are the most important drivers of economic dynamism and employment. Governments’ deficit spending is the enemy of economic dynamism. My two-year mandate ends on July 31st, therefore this is my last address as President of the SME UNION. I would like to express my satisfaction about the intensive support being given to the Presidency by our active members in our efforts to fully comply with proper governance rules. The thanks goes in particular to some of our most active members - the Romanian friends and the SME UNION of the CDU/CSU supporting always the decisions of the SME UNION Presidency in its efforts for transparency and to fully comply with the law and rules of good governance. Their continued extraordinary financial support was very welcome. I have enjoyed very much the debate with many of you in the last years on important economic issues for Europe in particular also with the view to enhancing innovation through a renaissance of an entrepreneurship culture in Europe. At the end of my term I wish you again a sunny and maybe not too exiting summer. | ||
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Nadezhda Neynsky (left) - Peter Jungen (center) - Marian Peter Milut (right) |
Peter Jungen: Welcome Nadezhda Neynsky, welcome Marian Petre Milut,
I welcome the election of Nadezhda Neynsky as the new President and of Marian Petre Milut as a Co-President of the SME Union. Nadezhda Neynsky’s vast international experience as former Bulgarian Foreign Minister and as a MEP is a good fit with the entrepreneurial experience of Marian Petre Milut who has a proven record as a successful Entrepreneur in Romania. I am sure that the election of the new President and the new Co-President is a good and forceful combination for the new leadership of the SME UNION. The General Assembly of the SME UNION had based on the proposals of President Peter Jungen elected Nadezhda Neynsky, SME UNION Vice-President and Member of the European Parliament as President of the SME UNION and Marian Petre Milut, Vice-President of the SME Union, as Co-President. The General Assembly also elected Peter Jungen as Honorary President and a new Presidency team of the SME UNION. The Presidency of the SME Union as of August 1st, 2011 according to the statutes is composed of:
Dimitar Avramov (Bul) and Bernhard Kösslinger (Ger) have been elected Internal Auditors | ||
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The SME UNION of the EPP held its General Assembly on June 29th in the SME UNION Headquarters. | ||
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Among these events:
These events gathered more than 20 MEPs as speakers and more than 30 in attendance. Among these MEPs were our vice-Presidents Nadezhda NEYNSKY and Frank ENGEL, Honorary President Paul RÜBIG, the President of the SME Circle Bendt BENDTSEN, Andreas SCHWAB, Peter LIESE, Iuliu WINKLER, Alojz PETERLE, Lara COMI, Gunnar HÖKMARK, Ioannis TSOUKALAS, Richard SEEBER, Anja WEISGERBER, Vicky FORD, Krišjanis KARINŠ, Csaba SOGOR, Theodor Dumitru STOLOJAN, Othmar KARAS, Burkhard BALZ, Malcolm HARBOUR, Wolf KLINZ. Two Commissioners, Nelly KROES and Günther OETTINGER, were speakers in events organized by the SME UNION. Additionally Directors General and other high rank officers of the European Commission, especially from DG Enterprise and Industry, participated in our events. Also EPP President Wilfred MARTENS, Minister of Finance from Slovakia Ivan MIKLOS and the Prime Minister of Lithuania, Andrius KUBILIUS were speakers in our events. The EPP Secretary General and Member of the European Parliament Antonio LÓPEZ-ISTÚRIZ WHITE attended the SME UNION Presidency meeting in November 2010. Furthermore Professor R. FRYDMAN from New York University (NYU) presented his brand new book in the framework of a Working Breakfast of the SME UNION. The economist Daniel GROS, Director of the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), spoke at the SME UNION Working Breakfast “Can the € survive?” Philip SCHINDLER CEO of Google for Northern and Central Europe, spoke in a SME UNION Working Lunch in April 2011 and Pierre-Alain GRAF, CEO of Swissgrid, was keynote in the SME UNION Working Breakfast “Next generation transmission grid”. Additionally President Peter Jungen attended as a speaker or in attendance more than 100 events during his mandate as President of the SME UNION.
Additionally 8 Events were organised with Member Organizations: | |||
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The two-year period 2009-2011 has been very active for the SME UNION in terms of communications. So far press releases were sent out to a large group of stakeholders: this notably increased the visibility of the SME UNION.
The SME UNION has delivered a monthly newsletter to its entire network containing information about the SME UNION events and latest developments for SMEs at the EU level. | ||
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European Monetary Union and the debt crisis.
Early in the discussion on the European debt crisis the SME UNION was the first European political institution to call for a European Monetary Fund, in a statement made by Peter Jungen on February 10th 2010. Consequently, he contributed in the EPP Political Assembly in Vilnius with a number of interventions in the debate about the future of the European Monetary Union (EMU). He was asked by the President of the EPP Wilfried Martens to draft the EPP resolution together with two other representatives of the EPP. On the same day President Martens applauded the SME UNION in the following EPP Political Assembly for its contribution to the debate and asked to continue this work to strengthen the debate on this issue. In this meeting of the Political Assembly Peter Jungen’s intervention concerning Basel III and the debt crisis was supported by President Martens. Peter Jungen agreed with President Martens that this debate will be continued with the involvement the SME UNION with various events and several statements in the following months, for instance the Working Breakfast with the Association of German Public Sector Banks (Bundesverband Öffentlicher Banken Deutschlands, VÖB) on "The Impact of Basel III on SME financing" or the Working Breakfast “Can the EU bridge the equity gap?” in cooperation with the European Network of Business Angels (EBAN). Moreover a letter was sent to EPP President Wilfried Martens and all the Members of the EPP Presidency on June 22nd by Peter Jungen critizing the handling of the debt crisis by the European leadership and the member countries regretting the lack of clear understanding of the issues and a coherent strategy to deal with these problems. Looking on the efforts undertaken until now the winner are greek politicians and special interest groups, the losers are the European tax payers and the young generation. The year 2011 will continue to be a big challenge for the Monetary Union. The European Financial Stability Facility has proven to be a flawed concept as one could see in the meantime. The establishment of the European Stability Mechanism, which is planned to come into force in 2013, is finally addressing the structural problems. However, its emphasis should be on prevention rather than on bail-out. In the end, long-term problems like excessive debt have to be addressed at national level. Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Europe lagging behind China and India. The European Commission and the European governments have to put in place the right framework conditions for innovation and SMEs to grow fast of particular importance is improved access to equity financing through Business Angels and Venture Capital. Furthermore, promoting women entrepreneurship could be unleashing the most important untapped potential for increasing entrepreneurial activities in Europe. The entrepreneurship culture, through a proper framework conditions, is a main factor to create in Europe a strong integrated single market and to boost European economy. Europe and the EU should focus on innovation and entrepreneurship instead of only dealing with the past mistakes. If the European governments will not succeed soon in resolving the debt crises in some countries through bold restructuring, economy dynamism in Europe will be killed by high debts from the past. The urgent need of more entrepreneurial culture was the central topic of several meetings organized by the SME UNION. Tax competition in Europe. The SME UNION also favours tax competition in Europe and has argued against any attempt to substitute this by a European Tax Policy as the EPP has decided also in the past. The advantages of tax competition becomes very clear by looking at countries like Ireland or the Slovak Republic, which have the lowest corporate tax-rates in Europe but at the same time the highest corporate tax revenues as percentage of GDP. | ||
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The SME UNION is now involved in all Working Groups of the EPP.
Peter Jungen was himself actively involved in the Working Group EPP1 now preparing a draft document “A stronger Europe to defend our Values and Interests” for the EPP congress in Marseille in December 2011: almost all the amendments presented by the President in the last WG EPP1 meeting were accepted and all of his proposals were supported by the Working Group. Peter Jungen also initiated a close cooperation with EPP Associations: He was invited as a keynote speaker to the Summer University of the European Democrat Students (EDS), in July 2010. The President of EDS, attended the Working Breakfast “Can the Euro Survive?” and asked Mr. Jungen to write an article in the September edition of the EDS magazine “Bullseye”. Peter Jungen was also a keynote speaker in early 2011 at the EDS 50th Anniversary Celebration Evening among other high-ranking European and international speakers and guests. Peter Jungen was also invited as a speaker to the Congress of the Youth of the EPP (YEPP) held in Berlin on May 14th. His speech was in between the statements by Chancellor Angela Merkel and by the German Minister of Finance Wolfgang Schäuble. Peter Jungen continued his good personal relations with the European Union of Christian Democratic Workers (EUCDW), and especially with the Chairman MEP Elmar Brok during the EPP congress of December 2009 in Bonn and in Working Groups. | ||
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Since September 2010 3 new members joined the SME UNION: 1 new full member and 2 new observer members. CDS – Partido Popular from Portugal is the new full member. The 2 observer members are the Romanian Christian Democrat Foundation (Fundatia Crestin-Democrata), the Moldovan Liberal-Democratic Party (Partidul Liberal Democrat din Moldova). All these new membership’s candidatures were approved unanimously. | ||
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| Upcoming events of the SME UNION | |||
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| SME UNION Working Lunch on "SME-Commerce: emrbracing the cross border potential" | |||
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The SME UNION will organize a Working Lunch on "SME-Commerce: emrbracing the cross border potential". The event will take place Wednesday, 21 September 2011, 12:30-14:00 at the European Parliament, Salon des Membres. For further information please contact our Project Manager Gianluca Panti at + 32 2 2333 832 or at gpanti@sme-union.eu. | ||
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| SMEs in a resource–efficient Europe | |||
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Peter Jungen has been invited as a speaker to the conference "SMEs in a resource – efficient Europe" organized by "Associazione Italiana Per Lo Sviluppo Economico (AISVEC)" and "European Political Analysis Group" (eupag) in Venice, Italy on November 25th 2011. The SME UNION will be partner in the organization. Peter Jungen will speak during the VIP Lunch. | ||
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| Service and information | |||
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| 'What is an SME?' Commission to ask | |||
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The European Commission intends to throw open the definition of SMEs to debate next year but the idea has met with a mixed response from stakeholders, who are unsure what purpose such a consultation will serve.
The announcement came in a review of the Small Business Act (SBA) held in the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), a consultative EU body representing workers and employers.
Massimo Baldinato, a member of the cabinet of Enterprise and Industry Commissioner Antonio Tajani, told the meeting that the Commission would open a consultation on the definition of SMEs next year.
If you want to read more click here to read the article from Euractiv Check the current definition of SME here | ||
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| EU to block bank accounts of bad payers | |||
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The European Commission proposed on July 25th a new legal tool to freeze the bank accounts of debtors in a bid to facilitate the recovery of cross-border credit and boost the EU-wide activities of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
Do you want to know more? Read here the article from Euractiv | ||
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...Zhou Xiaochuan, Governor of the Chinese Central Bank at the Group of 30 meeting in Washington on Sunday, October 10th 2010. | ||
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...the US Ambassador in Germany Phil Murphy and his wife Tammy Murphy at the 4th of July Event in Berlin in 2011. | ||
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...Elmar Brok MEP and Chairman of the European Union of Christian Democratic Workers (EUCDW). | ||
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...President of the EPP Wilfried Martens (center), Mr. Bilk (left) and Hans-Gert Pöttering (right) at the EDS Anniversary in Brussels. | ||
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...the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. | ||
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...Professor Roman Frydman in New York. | ||
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...Professor Jagdish Bhagwati in New York. | ||
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...President Wilfried Martens (left) and the US Ambassador to the EU (center) at the celebration of 35 years of the EPP as well as President Wilfried Martens’ 20 years as President. | ||
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...Nobel Prize Robert Mundell (left) and Mr. Zhu Min, new Chinese Deputy Managing Director of the IMF (right) at the Santa Colomba Conference held in Siena, Italy. | ||
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...the Moldovan Prime Minister Vlad Filat. | ||
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| Other events attended by SME UNION President Peter Jungen | |||
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| 5 July 2011 - MIT (German SME UNION) Federal Board Meeting, Berlin | |||
| Peter Jungen attended the MIT (German SME UNION) Federal Board Meeting in Berlin and the Summer reception of the SME UNION Circle of the German Bundestag with whom a good relation exists. | |||
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| 8 to 10 July 2011 - Santa Colomba Conference, Siena | |||
| Peter Jungen was invited as a discussant to attend the annual round table by Professor Robert Mundell, Nobel Laureate, Columbia University. It is now forty years since the first Santa Colomba conference on the international monetary system took place. | |||
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| 17 July 2011 - General Meeting of the MIT (German SME UNION) of Baden Württemberg | |||
| Peter Jungen was invited to the Annual Meeting of the MIT (German SME UNION) of Baden Württemberg where he gave a keynote speech. | |||
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| 28 July 2011 - MIT Northrhine Westfalia Board Meeting, Düsseldorf | |||
| Peter Jungen attended the MIT NRW State Executive Committee Meeting in Düsseldorf. | |||
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| Future events: Peter Jungen... | |||
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| 19 August 2011 - Corporate Finance Partners Group and Founders Forum, European Business School, Rheingau | |||
| ...has been invited as a keynote speaker on early stage investing in Europe including an international comparison | |||
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| 31 August 2011 - European Forum Alpbach | |||
| ...will be a speaker on the Panel: "Economic Efficiency between competition and regulation" organised by the Hayek Foundation. | |||
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| 7 September 2011 - Conference on SME financing, Helsinki | |||
| ...has been invited as a keynote speaker. The conference is organized by Prof. Olavi Uusitalo from the Tampere University of Technology and will be focused on the results of the academic research project about the financing needs of SMEs. | |||
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| 15 and 16 September 2011 - OECD Working Party on SMEs and Entrepreneurship Informal Steering Group on SME and Entrepreneurship Financing | |||
| …has been invited as a speaker by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to the meeting of the OECD Working Party on SMEs and Entrepreneurship Informal Steering Group on SME and Entrepreneurship Financing at the OECD Headquarters in Paris. | |||
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| 19 September 2011 - New York Angels Meeting at Microsoft, New York | |||
| … has been invited as a discussant to a conference "Online eco-system – who makes money and how". The meeting will bring together Executives from Microsoft, Yahoo, Google and other mayor players with founders and start-ups in the Internet space. | |||
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| Furthermore Mr. Peter Jungen is planning to participate... | |||
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| 23 - 25 September 2011 - 2011 IIF Membership Meeting IIF( Institute of International Finance), Washington | |||
| ...will attend at the 2011 IFF Annual Membership Meeting that will be held at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Washington, DC. Over 1,000 of the world’s leading bankers, investors, insurers, economists and policymakers will attend what has become the pre-eminent annual private sector event in the global financial calendar. The meeting will hear perspectives and opinions from leaders in the worlds of banking, finance and politics and will have a strong appeal to our international constituency. | |||
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| 23 - 25 September 2011 - Annual Meetings of the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund 2011, Washington | |||
| …at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund, were government officials, the private sector, journalists, civil society representatives, and other interested observers gather in Washington DC for the Annual Meetings of the World Bank and IMF. At the heart of the gathering are meetings of the joint World Bank-IMF Development Committee and the IMF’s International Monetary and Financial Committee, which discuss progress on the work of the World Bank and IMF. Also featured are seminars, regional briefings, press conferences, and many other events focused on the global economy, international development, and the world’s financial markets. | |||
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| 25 September 2011 - Group of Thirty Meeting, Washington | |||
| …at the Group of Thirty Meeting (G30) organized in Washington DC on Invitation of Paul Volcker and Jacob Frenkel. The Group of Thirty aims to analyze issues of particular or systemic importance to the global financial markets, comprising experts in the specific field from the regulatory, financial and academic communities. | |||
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| 25 September - Reinventing Bretton Woods Committee | |||
| ...at the annual meeting "Reinventing Bretton Woods Committee" organised alogside the IMF Meeting in Washington. Reinventing Bretton Woods deals in particular with issues of the global monetary system. | |||
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| 4 October 2011 - Global Economic Symposium (GES) 2011, Kiel | |||
| …as a speaker at the Global Economic Symposium (GES) that will take place in Kiel, Germany. The Global Economic Symposium (GES) provides solution proposals for major global problems. These solution proposals are generated by a dialogue among leaders from academia, business, politics and civil society. The dialogue is supported by the Virtual GES, the web based platform of the GES, containing back ground research, policy and strategy proposals, as well as discussion forums. | |||
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| 17 - 18 October 2011 Committee on Global Thought, Paris | |||
| ...at the conference organised by the “Committee on Global Thought”, Columbia University and the Research Institute on Sovereign Wealth Funds to attend a Conference in Paris on October 17th / 18th 2011. The title of the Conference is: SWF and other LTI: “From Savings Glut to Sustainable Growth”. | |||
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| 28 to 29 October 2011 – National Convention of the German SME Union | |||
| …on the National Convention Congress of the German SME Union in Deggendorf, Bavaria. | |||
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| 6 December 2011 – Conference of the Youth of the CDU/CSU | |||
| …as a speaker at the Conference of the Youth of the CDU/CSU in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony. “Entrepreneurship – Germany needs a renaissance of entrepreneurship!”. | |||
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| Spring 2012 | |||
| …at the Annual Conference organized by the Institute of New Economic Thinking (INET) in Europe where Peter Jungen was a speaker in April 2010 in Bretton Woods. | |||
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| March 2012 | |||
| …at a conference in Beijing on the invitation of the Chinese Academy for Social Sciences. | |||
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For comments and further information please do not hesitate to contact us. If you wish to read this in your own language you can copy the text and use the following tool : http://translate.google.com SME UNION 62 rue du Trone 1050 Bruxelles Tel : (+32) 2 233 38 31 Fax : (+32) 2 230 92 18 sme@sme-union.eu http://www.sme-union.eu Content Manager : Gianluca Panti Unsubscribe / subscribe to the SME UNION Newsletter (secure connection) |
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| Newsletter July 2011 | |||
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