France's Dalkia buys Poland's state-owned electricity, heating group ZEC Lodz

Dalkia, the energy services venture owned 66 pct by Veolia Environnement and 34 pct by Electricite de France, said it has acquired ZEC Lodz, a supplier of electricity and heating to Lodz, Poland's second-largest city, from the Polish government.

The company operates three co-generation power plants, and provides heating to about 70 pct of the cities residents. Electricity is sold to a local distributor, and also to the Polish railway operator.

ZEC Lodz has annual sales of 167 mln eur, and Dalkia said the acquisition will nearly double its annual sales in Poland, to about 300 mln eur.

Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

(Source: AFX News Limited)

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Mittal wants new CZK 10 billion plant, Czech Republic, Poland in play

The new EUR 300-350 million (up to CZK 10.2 billion) plant for sheet metal production that the Mittal Steel group plans to build in Central Europe should be located in Ostrava, North Moravia, or the Polish cities of Krakow or Katowice, Mlada fronta Dnes wrote yesterday referring to the Financial Times.

The new facility, which should supply products to new car producing plants in the Czech Republic and neighbouring Slovakia, would employ hundreds of people, the paper said.

The owners of Mittal Steel, which also controls Czech steelworks Mittal Steel Ostrava (previously Nova hut), have already been considering the investment for half a year.

Mittal Steel Ostrava supervisory board deputy chairman Frantisek Chowaniec said it was obvious that it is necessary to invest in the production of sheet metal for the automotive industry and white goods production in Central Europe in the near future. Mittal Steel representatives have just not decided exactly where and when the plant will be built.

Only Arcelor in Luxembourg, Germany's Thysen-Krupp and Austria's Voest-Alpine manufacture sheet metal for the car industry in Europe at present.

(Source: Prague Daily Monitor)

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R.R. Donnelley to Buy Poligrafia for $53.3M

Printing services provider R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co. said Thursday that it plans to expand its Central European operations with the $53.3 million acquisition of Poligrafia SA, Poland's third largest printer of magazines, catalogs, retail inserts and books.

R.R. Donnelley announced a tender offer to buy Poligrafia's 5.3 million outstanding shares for the equivalent of about 8.10 euros ($10.05) per share. Poligrafia shares are publicly traded on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. The company has already signed an agreement to acquire about 56.2 percent of the outstanding shares from Baring CEF Investments IV Limited, and expects to close the tender offer soon.

The company will fold Poligrafia in with its European operations. Donnelley said that it has already developed a presence in Poland, having constructed manufacturing plants there more than 10 years ago.

"Adding Poligrafia's respected capabilities to our platform will increase the flexibility and scale of our already strong Central European operations," said Mark A. Angelson, RR Donnelley chief executive, in a statement. "This combination will enhance manufacturing efficiencies and enable us to serve a larger and broader mix of customers in this important region."

(Source: Associated Press)

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Polish footwear company CCC invades Czech Republic

Polish footwear company CCC SA plans to boost its standing within the Czech Republic.

CCC has already opened four footwear stores in Czech Republic this year and aims to add another four by the end of 2005.

The company eyes a chain of more than 40 stores there within the next few years.

(Source: just-style.com)

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Poland is good for your brand!

Polish customers tend to buy only known brand products says TNS OBOP. 80% of Poles chooses brand products, half of them can pay more for known brand. You can see the chart here. Polish consumers does not mind whether products are made in Poland or abroad, they are looking for quality of the produyct and brand recognition of its producer.

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IBM and Philips Morris invest in Poland!

IBM and Philips Morris are to open their service centres in Krakow in the south of Poland. Experts say this marks the second wave of foreign investments moving from the west to Poland. Experts say Poland will export an increasing number of services and not only in finances, investments in health service look also attractive in the country owing to low costs of treatment in Poland. Besides a number of factors lure investors: well educated staff speaking foreign languages, low workforce costs, and few cultural barriers.
Companies have invested over 12 billion us dollars in India almost 9 billion dollars in Ireland and so far only some 600 million dollars in the whole central eastern Europe.

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Poland - the best place for snails?

THE organiser of France's greatest snail-eating festival has paid tribute to the Polish gastropods that appear to have saved Gallic gastronomy.Mr Pommier is chairman of the festival committee in Digoin, Burgundy, where 15,000 people ate 96,000 snails during a banquet this weekend. Like most of the snails eaten in France, the ones in Digoin had been gathered in Eastern Europe. "The snails we ate almost all came from Poland," Mr Pommier said. "There are not enough in Burgundy to feed us." Jacques Pommier said that the Polish imports had rescued the Burgundy Snail Festival. France consumes about 30,000 tonnes of snails every year, just under half of which are the variety known as the Burgundy snail. Mr Pommier said: "We are absolutely not against Polish snails. We welcome them." (news taken from http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/)


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GSK is going to open its IT center in Poland

GlaxoSmithKline has announced that the company will open its European IT center in Poznan, Poland this year.