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2013-08-02 00:00:00
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On the same day that General Electric announced its expansion plans within Hungary, the country also celebrated the grand opening of new headquarters in Budapest.
National Economy Minister Mihály Varga and Bosch Hungary President/Robert Bosch Ltd. CEO Javier González Pareja were on hand for the opening, a new workplace for 350 Bosch employees. Investment in the 11,000 square meter facility pushed Bosch’s total contribution to its Hungarian operations to a whopping €1 billion in 10 years.
Better still for the local economy, Bosch will be investing a total of €30 billion more by 2015 in the Budapest facility in increasing its space to some 50,000 square meters, a surface area of “roughly six football fields,” as pointed out in Bosch PR. Ultimately, 1,200 will be employed in the facility after 850 engineers currently on the Bosch payroll will be moved in with the 350 working there now.
Echoing the sentiments of GE Oil & Gas Manufacturing Business Unit global head Dave Cox, Bosch Management Board Member Uwe Raschke complimented Hungary’s “highly-qualified and motivated associates” and described the country itself as “an important manufacturing and engineering location.”
Indeed it is. The Bosch Group first established operations in Hungary in 1899 and today is home to the corporation’s single largest R&D facility in Europe outside of Germany. Turnover from Bosch’s Hungarian business (HUF 594 billion in 2012) is worth an incredible 2% of the country’s annual GDP, according to Pareja’s figures, and Bosch is the second-largest foreign-based employer with 8,500 working for the company.
Small wonder, then, that Varga took the opportunity to sign a strategic partnership agreement with Bosch on behalf of the national government, making the company the 30th to do so. The contract was part of the sitting government’s plan to “establish a favorable and predictable economic environment for enterprises that have already established a presence in Hungary,” in Varga’s words.
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