German Multinational Company Opens Central Hub In Budapest

German Multinational Company Opens Central Hub In Budapest

2023. 02. 23.

KOSTAL Group, a German family-owned company, opened its new sustainable flagship office in Budapest, bringing a new way of working into the KOSTAL Family. The new business services center will be the hub of the company's overall operations and global sustainability efforts, which is also reflected in the design of the office.

The family-owned multinational German company, mainly known as an automotive supplier, with a presence in 21 countries on four continents, that always focused on technological innovation decided to open a new chapter of its business by investing in the innovation of internal structures and processes. As a result, the new central hub for global business services has opened its doors for the latest members of the KOSTAL Group. 

In order to be able to continue to focus on technology and customer orientation, the bundling of parts of our administrative activities is a necessary and logical step. In our view, Budapest with its large number of highly qualified employees is the best location for our shared business services,

stated Andreas Kostal in his speech during the formal office opening ceremony.

A regional stronghold of the BSC sector

German companies contributed to FDI inflow to Hungary in 2021 to a great extent as always. They accounted for 30% of the investment volume and 40% of all newly created jobs. KOSTAL’s current BSC project forms an important chapter of this success story.

Employing 70,000+ predominantly highly skilled workers, the BSC sector is a dynamically growing segment of the Hungarian economy,

HIPA CEO István Joó highlighted the economic importance of KOSTAL’s new office.

The Hungarian Investment Promotion Agency alone guided 103 related projects creating over 19,000 jobs from 2014 to 2022.

Our country has become a leading global BSC hub in the CEE region, and everything points in the direction that she can remain an attractive investment target. For we are confident that we would be able to attract and retain talent and keep up the inflow of investments,

Mr. Joó said.

Steady growth with structural improvements

Data shows that not only the sector’s growth curve will remain steady but positive structural improvements are underway as well. The Business Services Hungary survey 2021 found that around half of respondents were planning to move up the value chain and expand vertically in the next year. On the other hand, nearly four in five companies were considering to bring high-value added functions to Hungary in a timespan of three years.

This outlook is very much promising because it also fits into Hungary’s strategic objective to incentivize investments that create high added-value. Last year HIPA was pleased to successfully close 20 such projects creating 2,500 jobs in the field of BSCs, ITC and R&D,

Mr. Joó added.

KOSTAL Business Services Center is not merely an office and is not even a location. It is a way of working. In our office, the work is fully flexible. No one is forced to come to the office for whatever number of days per week - unless they want to,

emphasized Péter Csucska, Managing Director of KOSTAL Global Business Services (KBS) regarding the office culture.  

A roadmap to go full steam

Both local and global end-to-end processes are currently being created at KBS. Some activities like Finance, PMO, select IT topics, and Sustainability are already up and running, while many more are at various stages of transition, and build. Here in Budapest, the plan is to exceed 300 employees by the end of 2024.

Csucska Péter underlined that they have hired some of the best professionals available in the country, and intend to use their experience, and all the best practices the BSC industry created in the last 20 or so years.

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