Slovak Republic will join EU 1 May 2004. As a new Member States will benefit from EU budgetary support. The main funding will come from CAP and Structural Funds. In 2004-2006 CEEC 10 will receive Euro 22bn for Structural Funds. Slovak Republic will receive Euro 1.6 Bn. This is a doubling from the current Phare allocation. Funding will further increase after 2007. The National Development plan has been developed – this will define the main priorities for the aid intervention. More detailed OPs have been developed in order to address Slovak priorities. The Slovak Government has started negotiations with the Commission on the OPs this summer and hopes to finalise before the end of the year. Expenditure for projects will in fact be eligible as from 1 January 2004, but funding will only become available after accession. Individual projects will have to be selected by the project promoters, generally the regions. These then submit them for the approval to the Managing Authority. Hewlet Packard (HP) is active in contributing towards projects implementation financed under Structural Funds support in Member states countries. HP is engaged in the process of selecting the best practice projects in EU15. These projects that have shown success can be adapted and transferred to Slovak republic. HP, by demonstrating few examples of its involvment in Member States countries would like to position itself as a knowlegable partner aiding transfer of know-how and best practice. Generally , for each Accession country the lessons should be learned from success and failure in the EU 15 applicants. These best practice solutions could be technical innovations, financial solutions (PPPs etc), networking etc As reinforced by recent EU declaration (July 2003) information and communication technologies will constitute a large part of these funds. It is important for the structural funds to operate successully that this commitment is maintained.