A near-capacity crowd filled the Radisson Carlton hotel conference center on April 19 for Slovakia's international property conference CEDES 2007. Delegates spent the entire day at this third annual event listening and participating in five panel discussions. Speakers were picked from among the most important names in Slovakia's property sector.

The first panel discussion featured a debate between the developers of Bratislava's premier office buildings. Moderated by Tomáš Krčula of Colliers International, the group on stage included J&T Real Estate's Miroslav Fülöp, Ivan Valent of HB Reavis, Ulrike Staudacher from Soravia Services, and Igor Horník of Digital Park. Discussion centered largely around the ability of Bratislava's office sector to absorb new office space along with the competing pressures of demands for quality, and low rents.

The second panel of the day was a discussion entitled "The Road to the Euro", which traced Slovakia's remarkable economic turnaround leading to its decision to adopt the euro by 2009. Elena Kohútiková of VÚB was joined on stage by Igor Barát from the Ministry of Finance and Martin Šuster from the National Bank of Slovakia. The group agreed that despite minor concerns over inflation, the country looks to be on course in beating the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary to the euro.

The final morning session focused on Slovakia's residential market, which has continued to thrive over the past year. Orco Group's Jason Cahill discussed the strategy behind his company's scheme Parkville in a discussion moderated by Adrian Barger of Squires, Sanders & Dempsey. Other panel members were Filip Žoldák, Lexxus, Katarína Pecnová, Salans and Peter Dahinel, Bond.

The first of the afternoon sessions was led by Clare Vernon of PWC who moderated the property finance panel. Slovakia may offer investors a smaller market, but this seems only to have intensified the competition between banks to provide them with financing. The result is what some warn are dangerously low margins for banks, but plenty of choice for developers. Panelists included Ľuboš Čema from UniCredit Bank, Slovenská sporiteľňa's Radoslav Jakab and Miroslav Tym of ČSOB.

Some of Slovakia's political elite then took the stage to finish off the successful day, as the mayors of Trenčín (Branislav Celler), Nitra (Jozef Dvonč) and Žilina (Ivan Harman) discussed their cities' development strategies, investment opportunities and visions for the future. The mayor of Prešov was unable to attend, but was aptly replaced by the city's dynamic Head of Property Management Daniela Štieberová. The discussion was marked by considerable interest from the audience, as the city officials were asked to field questions on the state of their master plans, their methodology in selling off city-owned property and whether the cities would consider pushing for a more rapid sell-off of municipal flats.

CEDES is organized by Roberts Publishing Media Group, publisher of Central and Eastern Europe's leading property magazine, Construction & Investment Journal. RPMG is also the organizer of other important conferences around the region, including CEDEM CEE, and of the CiJ Awards, held in Budapest, Prague, Warsaw and for the first time in 2007, in Bratislava.