On May 22–23, 2025, the School of Business Administration in Karviná hosted the international conference Decision-Making for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (DEMSME 2025). The event brought together experts from academia and business interested in decision-making processes in small and medium-sized enterprises and their practical application with the support of informatics, mathematics, marketing, economics, and management.

The main goal of the conference was to create a platform for expert discussions on decision-making in the business environment from an interdisciplinary and international perspective. Participants shared their experiences, established professional contacts, and gained inspiration for further research and development. An integral part of the program was a lecture by Ondřej Dobeš from the CzechInvest agency, focusing on entrepreneurship as a second career for individuals aged 40 and over. Attendees learned about the motivations of this target group, the obstacles they overcome in business, and the fact that their decisions often represent a well-thought-out strategy rather than merely an alternative later in their professional careers. The presentation also included current research data offering new insights into the topic. The lecture was conducted as part of the project “Entrepreneurship as a Second Career (Entrepreneurship 2.0),” co-financed with state support from the Technology Agency of the Czech Republic under the Sigma Program (TQ01000115).

As part of the conference, the 10th International Scientific Conference on Business Administration was also held, organized in cooperation with the partner university Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University from Turkey. This expanded the thematic scope and strengthened international collaboration.

The articles presented at the conference will be published in the proceedings, which will be submitted for indexing in the Web of Science. Selected articles will be published in partner academic journals indexed in Web of Science or Scopus, or in a peer-reviewed monograph published by IGI Global in the USA. The authors of the highest-rated paper received a one-year membership in the European Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (ECSB, ecsb.org).

We believe that the fifth edition of the DEMSME conference was once again a success, and we look forward to meeting you next time.

More information about the conference is available on the conference website demsme.opf.slu.cz.