CEOs plan investments predominantly in IT, operations, and digital transformation
The Most Respected CEO 2020 Award was presented to Mr Šimon Šicko, CEO of Pixel Federation. Two-thirds of CEOs in Slovakia are not considering postponing or cancelling planned investments and plan investments predominantly in IT, operations, and digital transformation. Business leaders would invest the extensive available EU funds in measures supporting an intelligent society. These findings are from the Slovak CEO Survey 2020 conducted by PwC and the Slovak edition of the Forbes Magazine.
Bratislava, 5 October 2020 – CEOs in Slovakia commented in the PwC survey on how they see the growth of the global economy and of their companies in the coming year, what investments and actions they are planning, and what threats they are most concerned about. The survey was conducted by PwC, a consultancy firm, in cooperation with the Slovak edition of the Forbes Magazine for the eleventh time, 143 and 105 CEOs responded survey in two waves in January and September 2020.
PwC and the Forbes Magazine presented The Most Respected CEO 2020 Award to Mr Šimon Šicko, CEO of Pixel Federation, during the online Slovak CEO Discussion Forum held on 5 October 2020, where business leaders discussed the survey results.
- Confidence of CEOs in Slovakia in global economic growth and their company’s revenue growth was significantly higher in September 2020 than in January 2020 and 2019
- Almost two thirds of CEOs in Slovakia are not considering deferring or cancelling planned investments due to COVID-19, they are mostly planning to realize investments in IT, operations, and digital transformation
- CEOs in Slovakia are most concerned about the impacts of the global economic downturn, a new wave of COVID-19 infections, and a decrease in consumer confidence reducing consumption
- Company leaders would invest the extensive available EU funds mainly in measures supporting intelligent society
Confidence of CEOs in Slovakia in global economic growth and their company’s revenue growth was significantly higher in September 2020 than in January 2020 and 2019
After the highest levels of pessimism at the start of 2020 before the outbreak of the pandemic, the percentage of CEOs who expect an acceleration of global economic growth has tripled. So, optimism has returned, but under significantly changed conditions. In September 2020, CEOs were also more optimistic as regards revenue growth at their firms, with 84% being very or somewhat confident of their companies’ growth. This percentage was 71% at the beginning of the year. CEOs in Slovakia are very confident that their organizations will be able to provide a safe working environment, retain talent, manage employee well-being and morale, and balance the needs of all stakeholders. Less of them believe they will be able to find new opportunities to generate revenue. In September 2020, up to three-quarters of CEOs in Slovakia planned to implement initiatives to streamline production/operations, and approximately the same percentage of CEOs globally had the same plans in autumn 2019. CEOs in Slovakia are expecting organic growth at their organization to a lower degree than at the beginning of the year.
Question: Choose 3 priorities according to you, in which areas should Slovakia invest as a priority a total of 41 billion from the Next Generation EU Fund and the European Structural and Investment Funds in the years 2014 - 2020 and in the years 2021 - 2027?
73%
Intelligent society
(increasing teachers' salaries, revising expenditure on groups at risk of poverty and social exclusion, supporting compulsory pre-primary education, reconciling education and the labour market in secondary vocational schools, supporting vocationally oriented bachelor's programs, implementing a system for verifying skills acquired outside the formal education system)
68%
Business environment and public administration
(fight against corruption and increase transparency of public administration, streamlining and improving the complexity of informatization of public administration, strengthening the building of analytical capacities of individual state institutions, improving electronic services of companies in contact with state authorities, reducing administrative burdens of entrepreneurs)
49%
Mobility
(completion of missing sections of the motorway network, completion of selected sections of expressways, strengthening the evaluation of infrastructure projects by means of the Value for Money Unit, increasing investments in streamlining the railway network)
46 %
Healthy society
(construction of university hospitals, renovation of hospitals, increasing the availability of outpatient clinics for general practitioners, improvement of acute care, electronic records in healthcare)
44 %
Green and digital transformation
(increasing grant funding and integration into the European Research Area, transparent allocation of grants for research and development activities of companies, relieving administrative burdens in the form of electronic public administration, supporting the digitization of individual sectors of the economy, building telecommunications and cloud infrastructure)
12 %
Labour market and the social area
(improving labour mobility through the construction of rental housing, support for retraining to increase the skills of the existing workforce, construction and renovation of social services homes, increasing the consistency of information systems of the Social Insurance Agency and Labour Offices)
Note for publisher
More information about Slovak CEO Survey 2020 you can find on: https://www.pwc.com/sk/sk/ceo-prieskum-2020.html
More information about Global CEO Survey you can find on: https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/ceo-agenda/ceosurvey/2020.html
The survey was conducted by PwC, a consultancy firm, in cooperation with the Slovak edition of the Forbes Magazine for the eleventh time. The contacted CEOs responded via an on-line questionnaire in two time periods – from 5 December 2019 to 31 January 2020 and from 31 August to 21 September 2020. In In total, 248 CEOs (143 in the first and 105 in the second time period) in Slovakia participated in the survey. Their companies are operating in various industries: financial services (banking & insurance), industrial manufacturing, construction, automotive, retail and distributive wholesale, consumer goods, transportation & logistics, information technology, telecommunications, energy & utilities and other sectors. The data for the Global CEO Survey was collected from September to October 2019 in 83 countries worldwide. 1581 respondents participated in the survey. The respondents’ sample is weighted by the national GDP of countries to ensure it is representative.
