Romania, the middle ground between China and Europe

Avira Soft Romania, a security software producer and a member of the Avira GMBH German group, will open, a technical support centre for the company”s worldwide customers, in Bucharest “in a month at the latest”, Mihai Anghel, Avira Soft general manager, told ZF.

The centre, to entail investments due to total around 50,000 euros by the end of this year, will initially be made up of 4-5 specialists, with 10-15 persons to be employed by yearend. Avira products are sold by 80 partners in 40 countries worldwide.

Avira Soft derived revenues worth “several hundred thousand euros” in Romania last year. This year, the company will witness a growth by about 30%, without turnover going beyond one million euros, according to Anghel.

What exactly will this centre do? Initially, customers notify Avira”s call centre in Germany of the problems they encounter.

From there, problems that cannot be solved in a simple manner (problems with obvious solutions, which are also included in the software manual, are regarded as simple) will be forwarded to the centre in Romania, where they are simulated so that a solution can be found, Anghel explained. In a specialised language, Level 2 technical support will be provided in Romania.

Why was Romania chosen? Avira”s headquarters are in Germany and the company has another branch in Austria, besides Romania. In Romania, the company already had several business lines serving customers of the parent company, including development, virus research, testing and marketing. When considering that only commercial, sales and marketing activities are carried out in Austria, Romania was the natural choice.

“Romania is a solid middle ground between outsourcing and nearby-outsourcing,” explains Anghel.

Practically, doing outsourcing in China or India may be quite troublesome for a European company, considering the distance and communication hurdles likely to emerge, he says.

“It”s not a matter of costs since costs are not that small in Romania,” but a matter of organisation and communication, says the general manager of Avira Soft Romania.

Avira Soft Romania was opened by the German company in 2004 and its activities were related to the development of an anti-virus solution. In the first year, Avira invested 500,000 euros in Romania. At present, the company has about 50 employees. In Romania, the firm has Genesys Systems and Gecad as its partners.

Early this month, the Avira GMBH parent company merged with H+BEDV of Germany, with the two firms having a common shareholding structure. Avira is going to open new branches, in New York and Singapore.