 I see these days that those Asian U.S. having very attractive programs for young talent and people brain-gain programs and therefore Europe have to sort of wake up. European universities are increasingly faced with a challenge of attracting and retaining the most promising research talent. People are prepared to relocate to places that offer the best research environments, the most attractive career opportunities and comfortable living conditions. We face the challenge of making Europe the destination of choice for the best students and researchers in the world. In the last decade we can see that strong schools from China and Hong Kong and Singapore are now on the top 100 list. So I think European universities cannot just continue to rest on their laurels that they are the old and established universities who got here first. The annual conference 2011 will mark the 10th anniversary of the European University Association. The theme of the conference is talent development, where we need to invest today to attract and develop the bright minds of tomorrow. I think talent development in universities then one of the primary challenges will be how to actually teach young talent to think out of the box, become independent, release from conventions and actually contribute to the development of science and society. The objective of the EUA annual conference 2011 is to find ways for Europe to increase its attractiveness for the most talented students and researchers. First of all we have to increase our investments in science and development. Secondly we have to refocus the investment we already are doing. We should have more bottom-up programs as the European Research Council programs with early starting grants and advanced grants. And then we have to rethink the way we are handing out the money in the larger EU programs. During the annual conference you will learn about state-of-the-art approaches to attracting and retaining talent internationally, exchange ideas about best practices in career development for young researchers and contribute to the discussion of EUA's priorities for the future. In the world we live in some of the biggest societal challenges and scientific problems require the best brains and I think it's very important that students see a career and that we can develop talents to engage some of these problems. The way to attract the best students is to have an internationally reputed, high quality dynamic faculty. The annual conference 2011 is hosted by Orhus University in Denmark. Orhus is located between two international airports and offers a wide variety of hotels in walking distance from the conference venue. Orhus University is honored to be hosting the EUA annual conference 2011 and looks forward to welcoming you to Orhus.