The German company for automotive cable installations Leoni plans an investment of 32 million euro and ensuring of 2000 jobs in Pleven town’s region. That was announced during the first shovel turned at the factory in the presence of the vice prime minister Tomislav Donchev, deputy minister of economy Lachezar Borissov, the mayor and governor of Pleven Georg Spartanski and Miroslav Petrov, executive directors of Leoni and others.
“Leoni’s decision to invest in the region of Pleven town is of particular importance to us. Their choice corresponds to the active policy that we conduct and the commitment to stabilizing and strengthening of Northern Bulgaria”, Minister Karanikolov stated. According to him, this investment will stimulate the economic growth and will contribute towards raising the effectiveness and competitiveness of the labor market in this region. Furthermore, he underlined that the investments are over 100 million leva only for the last few weeks, reminding of the newly-opened factory for aircraft parts a few days ago in Plovdiv.
Investor and main builder on Bulgarian part with a long-term rental contract signed is “Horizont-Ivanov”, which has invested 16 million euro. Svetoslav Bogalinski – “Business development” director, announced that “Today’s start of building this factory is a result of two years of enthusiasm in the work of Horizont-Ivanov. We are thankful to Leoni for their trust and partnership. This is a success not only for us as a construction-investment company, but also for Bulgaria and the Northwest.”
The minister of economy further clarified, that Bulgaria and Germany are enjoying a record high bilateral trade and during the last years it exceeds over 7 billion euro annually. In his opinion, of the one part, this is a clear sign that the two countries are more than successfully developing their bilateral relations and, of the other part, this means that Bulgaria has high potential in attracting investments through the undertaken measures in this direction, introducing elements such as the dual system of education, issuing of the so-called “blue cards” aiming to overcome the insufficiency of labour force, decrease the administrative weights, development of industrial zones and others.
Minister Karanikolov reminded that 15 certificates under the Investment Promotion Act have been issued since the beginning of 2018 and the foreseen investments equal nearly 700 million leva, while 1316 new working places are expected to be created. Great amount of these projects will be realized in the highly technological and production sector, where goods and services with high added value will be produced. He added that so far there are 56 investment projects undergoing certification for nearly one billion euro and 4327 new working places are expected to be opened.