Karel Havlíček

Deputy Speaker, Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic (Czech Republic)

He graduated from the Faculty of Civil Engineering at the Czech Technical University in Prague (ČVUT), continued his studies at PIBS at Manchester Metropolitan University, and completed his doctoral studies at the Faculty of Business Administration at the University of Economics in Prague (VŠE), where he also earned his habilitation as an associate professor at the Faculty of Finance and Accounting. Since the turn of the millennium, he has represented the interests of entrepreneurs, notably as Chairman of the Board of the Association of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and Crafts of the Czech Republic. As a co-owner and CEO of the SINDAT Group, he has spent the past two decades transforming the company into a respected investor in the fields of small and medium-sized industries and new technologies. He has been active in academia for many years and is currently associated with the University of Finance and Administration, where he established the Faculty of Economic Studies and developed the study program "Economics and Management." He has authored several professional books and published dozens of peer-reviewed articles both in the Czech Republic and abroad on the topic of small and medium-sized enterprises. He has served on numerous advisory boards for the government and ministries and has been a member of the Government Council for Research, Development, and Innovation since 2014, becoming its Vice-Chairman in 2018. He is the principal author of the government’s innovation strategy *Czech Republic: The Country For The Future*. In April 2019, he was nominated by the Prime Minister for the positions of Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs and Minister of Industry and Trade. He was appointed to both roles by the President of the Czech Republic on April 30, 2019. On the same date, he relinquished all statutory and ownership positions in the business sector and stepped down from leading the Association of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and Crafts of the Czech Republic. On January 24, 2020, Karel Havlíček also became Minister of Transport. He served in both ministerial positions until December 17, 2022, and on February 18, 2022, he was elected Deputy Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic.