Faculty and staff from the College of Business at the University of Nevada, Reno and representatives from Nevada businesses participated in the Business Education Mission last month to build connections with global networks that can provide support and partnerships in future projects. This mission was the first organized directly by the Ozmen Center for Entrepreneurship within the College of Business. It was also the first mission under the Nevada International Trade Program, a new joint initiative by the Ozmen Center and the Nevada Small Business Development Center.

The mission included visits to four cities within three countries: Prague, Czech Republic, Istanbul, Turkey, Warsaw, Poland, and Karpacz, Poland. During the trip, attendees held meetings with international businesses and government organizations and participated in several forums, round-table discussions and tours in each city.

Director of the Ozmen Center for Entrepreneurship and Director of International Programs Mehmet Tosun, one of the faculty on the mission, was satisfied with the outcomes of the mission after building connections with resourceful organizations during this year’s travels.

“The Business Education Mission opens up the state of Nevada to the outside world, and it gives the University and the College more access to business partners for future ideas and endeavors,” Tosun said. “We are receiving immediate outcomes from our travels this year and are expecting to host new international partners and accept invitations from brand new organizations.”

In the first week of November, faculty members from the College will greet new investment partners from CzechInvest, an investment and business development agency established in the Czech Republic. This visit will be followed by another group representing tech startups from Turkey. One of those startups recently reached $1 billion market capitalization, also known as unicorn status.

“We are going to host CzechInvest here and they are going to learn more about the business environment, as well as the economic and entrepreneurial system in Northern Nevada,” Tosun said. “We will be mainly expecting managers of startup support groups, but their main job and purpose of traveling to Reno is to bring big businesses and organizations to the United States and introduce them to American markets.”

Other positive outcomes from the trip included faculty members in the College being contacted by the U.S. Commercial Service for future business trips.

“We were invited to travel abroad again by the U.S. Commercial Service, who are a part of the U.S. Department of Commerce and are considered the commercial officers in these foreign countries,” Tosun said. “We initially met members of the U.S. Commercial Service in Prague, Warsaw and Istanbul, and we were invited to attend several meetings and events taking place during the spring of next year.”