Brno, Město Brno District, South Moravian Region, Czech Republic

🇨🇿 Brno is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno is the second-largest city in the Czech Republic after the capital, Prague, and one of the 100 largest cities of the EU.

Brno is the former capital city of Moravia and the political and cultural hub of the South Moravian Region. It is the centre of the Czech judiciary, with the seats of the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court, the Supreme Administrative Court, and the Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office, and a number of state authorities, including the Ombudsman, and the Office for the Protection of Competition. Brno is also an important centre of higher education, with 33 faculties belonging to 13 institutes of higher education and about 89,000 students.

Brno Exhibition Centre is among the largest exhibition centres in Europe. The complex opened in 1928 and established the tradition of large exhibitions and trade fairs held in Brno. Brno hosts motorbike and other races on the Masaryk Circuit, a tradition established in 1930, of which the Road Racing World Championship Grand Prix is one of the most prestigious races. Another cultural tradition is an international fireworks competition, Ignis Brunensis, which attracts tens of thousands of visitors to each display.

The most visited sights of the city include the Špilberk Castle and fortress and the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul on Petrov hill, two medieval buildings that dominate the cityscape and are often depicted as its traditional symbols. The other large preserved castle near the city is Veveří Castle by Brno Reservoir. Another architectural monument of Brno is the functionalist Villa Tugendhat, which was added to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites in 2001. One of the natural sights nearby is the Moravian Karst. The city is a member of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network and was designated a "City of Music" in 2017.

Education Over the past two decades Brno has evolved into an important university city; the number of students at Brno's higher education institutions reached 89,000 in 2010. The city has also become home to a number of institutions directly related to research and development, including the Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC), and the International Clinical Research Center (ICRC). The city is also gaining importance in various fields of engineering, especially in software development. Companies operating in Brno include AVG Technologies (headquarters), IBM (Client Innovation Centre), AT&T, Honeywell (Global Design Center), Siemens, SGI (Czech headquarters), Red Hat (Czech headquarters), and Motorola.

With over 40,000 students, Masaryk University is the largest university in Brno and the second biggest in the Czech Republic. Today, it consists of nine faculties, with more than 190 departments, institutes and clinics.

The Brno University of Technology was established in 1899, and is now among the biggest technical universities in the Czech Republic with over 20,000 students. Viktor Kaplan, inventor of the Kaplan turbine, spent nearly 30 years at the German Technical University in Brno, which ceased to exist in 1945, its property transferred to Brno University of Technology.

Mendel University, named after the founder of genetics Gregor Mendel, who developed his revolutionary scientific theories in Brno, has roughly 10,000 students.

Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts, named after Leoš Janáček, was founded in 1947 and is one of two academies of music and drama in the Czech Republic. It holds the annual Leoš Janáček Competition.