EU Migration Talks “The Race for Innovative Talents”

Organizer: National Contact Point Austria in the EMN

18 December 2019, Vienna

 

EU Migration Talks
“The Race for Innovative Talents”

18 December 2019, 15:00 – 17:00
Impact Hub Vienna

“Austria shall become a Start-up Magnet” declared the Austrian government to mark the launch of the Red-White-Red Card for Start-up Founders in 2017. Recent years have seen an expansion of immigration schemes for start-ups and innovative entrepreneurs, both within the EU and globally. Austria and 11 other EU Member States provide for special visas and residence permits to facilitate the immigration of start-up founders from non-EU countries. In the face of demographic change and labour market needs the race for innovative talents is gaining momentum. However, since the implementation of the Red-White-Red Card for Start-up Founders the residence permit has only been issued three times (September 2019). The challenges for start-up founders from non-EU countries wanting to immigrate to Austria are manifold – bureaucratic obstacles, high entry requirements and considerable costs – just to name a few.

On the occasion of International Migrants Day on 18 December, the European Migration Network in Austria hosted an interactive discussion as part of its discussion series EU Migration Talks: “EU Migration Talks – The Race for Innovative Talents”. Together with policy makers, experts and start-up founders we discussed migratory pathways for innovative entrepreneurs from non-EU countries to Austria and compared the situation to other EU Member States. We critically reflected on the Start-up-Ecosystem for non-EU start-ups and outlined approaches to make Austria more attractive for international entrepreneurs.

The speakers included: Annamaria Andres (Austrian Research Promotion Agency); Christina Knahr (Ministry for Digital and Economic Affairs); Rafael Rasinger Amivilia (Austrian Economic Chamber); John Shen (Xencio); Alexander Spiegelfeld (IOM Country Office for Austria); Tülay Tuncel (Vienna Business Agency).