The circular economy should be a way of life

Economy Minister Florin Spataru sat down with Business Review and talked about the Ministry’s plan to finance green projects developed by the manufacturing industry with the aim of encouraging the implementation of the circular economy model at a larger scale.

By Anda Sebesi

The Economy Ministry is currently working to develop a state aid scheme to support the manufacturing industry in its adoption of circular economy principles. How many projects do you expect this scheme to target?

The circular economy must be a goal for management teams in all companies in Romania. Implementing the principles of the circular economy results in environmental protection and added value on the entire economic chain. The Economy Ministry has created a Mechanism to offer state aid financing for the manufacturing industry through the Transition Plan Towards a Circular Economy. All applicants whose projects will include the circular economy component will benefit from financial support between EUR 15,000 and EUR 200,000 under the state aid scheme. We are currently working on the programme guide, which will set up the implementation of the scheme and the steps companies should take in order to access these funds. The call for proposals will be open by the end of this year. The maximum budget of the state aid scheme is EUR 8 million and will be available in two instalments: EUR 2 million in 2022 and EUR 6 million in the 2023-2025 period. The transition towards a circular economy is one of the main objectives our country has committed to as a member of the European Union. We need both a national strategy that is adapted to the realities of the Romanian economy and a legal framework that can support companies operating in this industry through this transition.

What can you tell us about the state aid scheme meant to support the refurbishment and development of new production lines in the manufacturing industry so that companies can cut their carbon emissions?

The Economy Ministry is dedicating a state aid scheme to the manufacturing industry for the first time in the last 30 years. Large companies in Romania now have access to EUR 300 million in grants for large investment plans worth at least EUR 3 million. As a result of an in-depth market analysis, we decided to prioritise investment plans that aim to cut dependence on imports in order to support the essential value chain in the development of the local economy. Green investments of minimum 10 percent of the value are mandatory for a project to be eligible. In addition, companies that will make investments in vulnerable of underpopulated areas across Romania, as well as those that will employ more than 100 individuals, will get a higher score in the evaluation process.

What can you tell us about the Ministry’s approach on the circular economy and environmental projects?

The current Industrial Policies team in the Economy Ministry has played a crucial role in the development of the circular economy strategy, which has already been approved by the Government. This strategy is a milestone within Romania’s Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) that’s due to be achieved by the end of September—so we’re right on schedule! Our entire team has contributed to the development of this strategy, which has changed the paradigm of the last few years and added crucial elements in terms of the role of waste recovery in the economy. In the coming period we will be working on the implementation plan for this strategy, which will be ready in May 2023. It will require all the important players in this sector to work as a team in order to set tangible targets within the strategy.

Daring to dream big: a story of inspiring leadership

One of the most experienced top executives in Romania, Stephane Batoux, who has been the Head of International at ETi International for more than five years now, shares his vision of leadership and gives insight into the company’s expansion plans.

By Anda Sebesi

Tell us your story. What first brought you to Romania?

I have been living in Romania for 13 years, since January 2009, when I took over the management of Danone Dairy at the regional level: Romania, Bulgaria, and the Balkans. Prior to that position, I had worked within the Danone Group for several years and I came to Romania from a GM role in Ukraine. After Danone, I joined Coca-Cola HBC Romania as General Manager, where I stayed for almost three years, until mid-2014. Afterwards, I accepted a proposal from Raul Ciurtin, the founder of Albalact, who asked me to lead his firm and manage the first company IPO on the Romanian stock market until the takeover by Lactalis Group in 2016. After the transaction with Lactalis was completed, I was offered a position inside the Lactalis Group, but I left with the intention to move into the entrepreneurial world, a dream I had had for many years. At the same time, a new and very interesting opportunity arose with ETi, one of the leading confectionery companies in Turkey.

Things lined up so well that I was happy to embark on this journey. The Chairman of ETi needed someone to lead the company’s expansion into new markets and it turned out I was the right person for this challenge. I travelled to their headquarters in Turkey, where I met the owner of the company and my current boss, Firuzhan Kanatlı, a visionary and inspiring entrepreneur who shared with me his dream of replicating the success they had in Turkey at a global level. It was this shared ambition and vision that made it so easy for me to accept this challenge. I was also impressed by the Group’s industrial capabilities, which operated at the highest quality standards I had ever seen and ensured that their products would be globally competitive.

What can you tell us about your leadership style?

I like to think big and I love to inspire others, especially the people on my team. As a leader, I think my main quality is that I’m able to give confidence to my team. They are highly skilled professionals who know exactly what they have to do and we believe that the biggest achievements can only be reached together as one. The leader I admire most is Nelson Mandela, not only for the cause he defended, but for the dedication and resilience he demonstrated in his quest for justice. "Never give up" is one of the values I live by, both professionally and personally.

ABOUT

Stephane Batoux, Head of International at ETi

With more than 20 years of experience in FMCG, Stephane Batoux has been leading ETi International since 2017. Prior to this role, he led the local and regional operations of Danone, Coca-Cola HBC, and Albalact. He holds a Master’s Degree in Economics from the University of Kent and an MBA from the École Supérieure de Commerce in Bordeaux, France.

ETi's values are embedded in your leadership strategy. How is this reflected in your leadership?

ETi is an agile company which is focused on innovation and quality; it’s determined to grow and write new chapters internationally, and that perfectly fits in with my leadership vision—"Think big"— as much as it continues to carry forward the vision of its founder, an entrepreneur who had a big dream and did not deviate from turning it into reality.

How big of a role does innovation play at ETi?

Innovation has been part of ETi's identity and DNA from the very beginning. ETi brought on the market breakthrough innovations such as ETi Dare, a dark chocolate wafer that has already received several distinctions from both retailers and consumers, and ETi Milk Burger, the uniquely shaped product that received the "Innovation of the Year in Europe" award in 2015. Over the course of a few years, ETi managed to become a trusted company and reach new horizons, having made important contributions to the development of the confectionery industry.

ARKA and Stefanini partner up for innovation in the courier industry

Logistics automation and the significant growth in online sales in the past few years have led to the development of increasingly efficient delivery solutions. One of them is the Smart Parcel Locker, developed by ARKA in partnership with Stefanini EMEA, which uses advanced software components to ensure the best customer experience.

By Aurel Constantin

Lucian Ulmanu, ARKA

ARKA’s Smart Parcel Locker solution increases the efficiency of courier delivery processes and provides new and innovative approaches through its agnostic software. The Smart Parcel Locker is a reliable solution designed to tackle the biggest challenges of the courier industry, leading by innovation. "The ARKA hardware has been devised to revolutionise the consumer experience when it comes to parcel delivery. The solution is a physical device that can be customised according to the client's requirements. The standard solution is roughly two metres high, with a width of at least two metres, and it features a touchscreen and multiple drawers, each with a depth of up to one metre. The platform allows parcels to be delivered without any direct interaction between the courier and the client, offering a more flexible and quicker process. Couriers can drop off several parcels at once, while customers can pick them up at any time—and they can even use the solution to return parcels,” says Cezar Frincu, the CTO of ARKA. "The initial solution was developed over a period of six months, through a process that consisted of an analysis stage, a development stage, and a testing stage. The process also involved co-creation involving multiple parties and represented an excellent combination of design thinking and hardware and software expertise. The platform is constantly evolving as we add various new features,” says Bogdan Burdalescu, Software Architect at Stefanini EMEA.

The platform completely decouples parcel delivery from parcel collection while also offering a simple way to manage deliveries in different geographies. It also optimises tasks and enables the courier company’s commercial partners to make deliveries directly to lockers, without having to pay for external couriers. Stefanini had previously created a predictability application and a personal digital assistant for the courier industry, which provided valuable experience during their engagement with ARKA. ”Our experience in this sector meant that we were able to fully understand the internal processes that exist within the business, which allowed us to optimise the app’s architecture and business logic,” Burdalescu notes.

“ARKA’s full development process is leading to impressive results and we are pleased to reveal that Stefanini will fully cover our software requirements,” adds Lucian Ulmanu, the CEO of ARKA.

Florin Stefan, Stefanini EMEA STEFANINI GROWING ACROSS EMEA REGION

“Stefanini is a USD 1 billion global technology company that has sustained a double-digit growth rate year after year. Our aim is to double our turnover in EMEA over the next three years. At the same time, we’ll continue our policy of diversifying our portfolio of services, especially in the area of digital technologies. We are also considering possible acquisitions across the EMEA region,” says Florin Stefan, Application Development Director at Stefanini EMEA.

With a 30-year history, Stefanini has managed to navigate multiple political, social, and economic crises and has even managed to grow during these periods. “Crises are undoubtedly difficult moments, but at the same time, they can create opportunities. When you provide high-value services, supplierclient relationships are transformed into true partnerships in which value and the enduser experience is maximised. It’s thanks to the strength of these partnerships that we believe we can withstand any disruption and be optimistic about the future,” says Florin Stefan.

“The digital revolution has caused a paradigm shift, which is why we believe every company should embrace the processes of changing and adapting to new technologies in order to remain relevant in their field. We want innovation to be the driving factor in most of the projects that ARKA will develop in the coming years,” says Lucian Ulmanu.

Four business expansion strategies Romanian founders are choosing in 2022

Romania has mostly had family businesses, enterprises owned by one or several entrepreneurs Alliances with large multinationals through the sale of a package of shares, replicating local projects on global markets, acquiring another company operating on the Romanian market, and taking over a competitor from abroad represent four growth approaches that local entrepreneurs have chosen this year in their business expansion strategies.

By Claudiu Vrinceanu

Jean Valvis, the founder of AQUA Carpatica, sold 20 percent of his company's shares to the PepsiCo group in a historic transaction for the Romanian business environment. This notable move was a first for the Romanian market, with an international FMCG giant acquiring a minority stake in a local brand. This will accelerate its expansion through exports, primarily to the US, a process that has been going on for several years now. Exports currently represent 7 percent of Aqua Carpatica's sales, and they will exceed 30 percent by 2027. Unlike other entrepreneurial successes in the history of Romanian capitalism that were majority or total exits (Betty Ice to Unilever, Joe to Nestle, LaDorna to Lactalis, Dorna Apemin to Coca-Cola, Supremia Grup to Solina), this sale was just partial. It will increase the international exposure of a Romanian brand and maximise the company's value. In business literature, it is well-known that ownership types influence a company's internationalisation strategy. So far, Romania has mostly had family businesses, enterprises owned by one or several entrepreneurs, companies accelerated by private equity or venture capital, and firms that were sold entirely to foreign investors.

REPLICATING LOCAL PROJECTS ON GLOBAL MARKETS

sion is for a company to try to scale products and projects that it has already implemented on the local market. In this framework, IT companies can grow more quickly thanks to the digitalization opportunities offered on the Romanian market. Several firms are developing in this manner. For example, the main goal of local entrepreneurial company Trencadis is to target countries that strongly need to digitalize their public administrations.

“As part of our development strategy, we want to accelerate our internationalisation plans by globally replicating projects we’ve successfully executed in Romania. An example of such a project is RoAlert, which is being used to notify the population in case of emergency, an integrated national impact project delivered by the Trencadis team. In our view, RoAlert is a successful case study in public-private collaboration. Our big data and cybersecurity projects are also landmarks, as well as Edulib, the project where we are creating a digital platform with open educational resources, implementing a component to test students' functional literacy, and an adaptive learning module,” says Marian Murgulet, the CEO of Trencadis.

BUSINESS EXPANSION THROUGH GLOBAL M&A

tribution to Romania’s exports, with EUR 2.6 billion per year. The growth potential is huge here; local IT entrepreneurs have acknowledged this potential and have been acquiring other companies. However, few have bought foreign companies, like Arobs did.

Arobs Transilvania Software, founded by entrepreneur Voicu Oprean in 1998, closed several transactions this year, but one in particular amazed the market: the takeover of Enea Software Development Services. Before the transaction, the acquired company was a wholly owned subsidiary of Enea Software AB, whose parent company Enea AB is listed on Nasdaq Stockholm. The value of the transaction reached EUR 17.9 million.

Through this acquisition, Arobs, which is listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, strengthened its Software Services division by integrating nearly 160 employees into the group. In the future, the company intends to boost its presence in Romania and the US and expand its client portfolio in the European and American markets.

In recent years, Romanian entrepreneurial companies have also started to scale up, making acquisitions abroad after many years of foreign investors coming in to buy local enterprises. One recent case study is SeedBlink, the Romanian-born platform for co-investing in tech startups, which bought Symbid, a Dutch crowdfunding platform.

Key players in Romanian traveltech and lessons from other countries

Over the past two and a half years, marked by the pandemic and war, several tech startups have emerged in Romania’s tourism sector. What’s been missing so far have been investors willing to participate in noteworthy financing to join angel investors who have already placed their trust in tourism.

By Claudiu Vrinceanu

Traveltech businesses are still behind other startup sectors

KEY INSIGHTS

Despite Romania’s extensive tourism infrastructure and the increased adoption of technologies in the travel industry, the travel tech industry still faces considerable challenges like finding suitable business models on a fragmented market. Traveltech businesses are still behind other startup sectors such as fintech, healthtech, edtech, or e-commerce, all of which have raised the interest of more investors. The most successful Romanian companies that book holidays, arrange transportation, and plan itineraries have so far been those created by founders who had formerly worked in the travel industry or used to be managers in marketing or IT roles.

PLAYERS

Traveltech is one of the few verticals in Romania with no programmes dedicated to entrepreneurs who open startups in the niche. Cockpit Innovation from Israel and Airbus Bizlab from France are two programmes that could inspire the Romanian traveltech ecosystem. Cockpit is EL AL's corporate venture arm, targeting digital travel and aviation entrepreneurs. Airbus BizLab provides wideranging support for early-stage projects in the form of a six-month acceleration programme, through which entrepreneurs, startups, and Airbus employee "intrapreneurs" are given access to coaching, expertise, and mentorship across various business lines.

TECH STARTUPS

Five of the most active and experienced Romanian traveltech startups and scaleups are Questo, Epicvisits, Travlocals, Pickatrip, and H2B. A simple case study indicates the direction of the companies' internationalisation and their potential to shake up the travel sector in 2022. Questo, the platform for city exploration games, raised a USD 1.5M round of funding last year, led by Early Game Ventures with Sparking Capital's participation. Questo enables tourists and locals to discover a city by unlocking challenges—via a mobile app—and revealing stories.

INVESTORS

Airbnb and Booking.com, which has created specialised investors. However, Romania doesn’t have that many active investors in the travel sector. Besides Early Game Ventures and Sparking Capital, venture capital investors that have invested in such platforms, we have seen involvement from the Seedblink crowdfunding platform as well as interest from business angels such as Dragos Anastasiu, a well-known tourism entrepreneur.

WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM OTHER COUNTRIES

Romanian traveltech startups still primarily rely on their own founders' resources, even though venture capital investment in the travel and tourism tech sector has experienced continuous growth throughout the last decade. Around USD 455 billion have been invested in travel and mobility tech startups in the past decade, according to UNWTO. Romania could learn more from Spain, for example, a market hosting 43 shortlisted and some winning competitors from the UNWTO's Challenges and Competitions. Spain launched its National Tourism Agenda: the 2030 Sustainable Tourism Strategy. As this strategy is the baseline for an effective transformation of tourism, it addresses five strategic axes: 1. Collaborative governance; 2. Sustainable growth; 3. Competitive transformation; 4. Tourist space, companies, and individuals; and 5. Product, marketing, and tourist intelligence. To strengthen innovation, Spain's Tourism Action Plan prioritises the deployment of a digital strategy for the tourism sector, using technological capacities in favour of more sustainable tourism management of destinations, and developing public policies for the digital transformation of the industry.

The Metaverse and its impact on the advertising industry

KUBIS, one of the leading independent integrated agencies in the region, marked its 14th anniversary by establishing a new division—KUBIS META—dedicated to Metaverse projects.

By Romanita Oprea

Marius Goleanu & Vlad Popovici, KUBIS & KUBIS Meta

The division will specialise in consulting, strategy, and implementation for immersive virtual experiences in host platforms such as Horizon Worlds, Decentraland or Roblox, in the development of proprietary virtual spaces, in strengthening partnerships with local and international NFT artists, as well as in creating assets, AR filters, gamified experiences, and partnerships with developers in the e-games industry.

“Our clients were thrilled to hear the news and welcomed our walking the talk in this important new playground for brands and consumers alike. I think the industry has not only noticed it, but that it has also felt obliged to step on the gas and accelerate investments. I have been reading recruitment ads from other local players suggesting they were also getting ready for this brave new world. This makes me happy as the more competitive this territory gets, the better we will all become,” said Vlad Popovici, managing partner at KUBIS, who agreed with the statement that KUBIS Meta had started a trend—one he fully embraces.

“At Ogilvy, we believe in Borderless Creativity. In this context, it means we are naturally inclined to explore the Metaverse and its seemingly endless opportunities. We have a strong capability to harness WPP Group’s global expertise in order to create the most compelling cases for our customers locally and we are taking steps towards upgrading their points of impact. It is just a matter of time until we establish a relevant presence in the Metaverse. It is an undeniable reality of our times and younger generations are clearly more curious and more inclined to experimenting with this new proposal. Therefore, we believe that Web 3.0 and its Metaverse component will become omnipresent in our modern day lives,” said Radu Bucur, social media & performance director at Ogilvy Romania.

On a contrasting note, while Alice Gavril, partner at Cognition & client service director at Godmother, believes KUBIS’s move was natural for a digital agency that positions itself as highly creative and innovative, she doesn’t really think it is going to start a trend. She sees it as a good PR move and less as a strong revenue line in the near future. “We will not push it just because it is a trend unless it would help a brand reach an objective. For the moment, we are interested in the topic and following different innovators in the field. We’d like to be among them or at least among the early adopters, so we may come up with a first project sooner rather than later, but we won’t say any more right now,” she noted. According to Radu Bucur, the Metaverse has a clear potential to impact our lives in a positive manner, in areas such as education (making learning fully experiential by opening up a whole new universe of immersive teaching aids); health (there are several cases already showing the positive impact of Metaverse applications to treat various mental health conditions); and entertainment (mixing the real and the virtual worlds to create new amplified interactive experiences).

“It will affect people’s lives exactly to the extent they will allow it to do so. It’s just like social media in this sense: it has its perks, but it can also become dangerous—and I’m thinking about kids here. But I think it could create a lot of added value. I recently read an article about doctors who can perfect their surgery techniques in the Metaverse. This is amazing. Learning can also become more interactive. But like anything in this world, I strongly believe it should have limits and that balance should always be sought out,” said Roxana Memetea, managing partner at DDB & Tribal Romania. As the representative of an agency that has already carried out a campaign in the Metaverse, she also believes that it’s just a matter of time before we find new creative ways of exploring this new universe.

According to Vlad Popovici, the Metaverse can open up a wide range of exciting possibilities that could change lives for the better. One example is The Uncensored Library, a Minecraft server and a map released by Reporters without Borders in a courageous attempt to circumvent censorship in countries

Alice Gavril, Cognition Radu Bucur, Ogilvy Romania

lacking press freedom. “NGOs could build safe havens in the Metaverse to offer help to people in need of dialogue, counselling or professional advice. NFTs have been used to harness the power of good in activations such as the recently Cannes Lions-awarded ‘Breakchains with Blockchain,’ an investment designed to release women from prison in Egypt, or ‘Buy my Cancer,’ a unique NFT series by the Alivia Cancer Foundation created from actual living cancer cells to help fight cancer in Poland,” the KUBIS Meta representative explained.

Furthermore, he believes that as more virtual reality briefs hit the agencies, their representatives will probably fight even more fiercely to recruit or retain skilled human resources in this area: from character designers and UX and UI designers to Swift, Python, and JavaScript coders and Unreal Engine developers. We will probably see more gaming professionals moving back to advertising and reversing a trend that started years ago.

WHAT IS IN STAKE

But how will the Metaverse impact the advertising industry as a whole? In Radu Bucur’s view, what we are seeing now is surely an early version of what an educated guess suggests will be a much larger network of 3D and virtual environments for interaction and experiences, but one thing is certain at this point. “The impact of the Metaverse on the industry is currently low, but definitely growing, with Bloomberg estimating an USD 800 billion total market size for the Metaverse by 2024. Today, the Metaverse is a spearhead for change, innovation, and creativity in the marketing world. Bold brands and creative agencies are tapping into the new potential that comes with the territory: AR/VR immersivity like never before, an array of virtual experiences, a new economy that now spans from non-fungible tokens to cryptocurrency, and new ways of collecting data and getting to know consumers. Several Ogilvy agencies

from the WPP Group are pioneers in exploring the Metaverse’s potential.”

In her turn, Alice Gavril believes that from an advertising standpoint, the Metaverse will see most of its development coming from a few specific areas: retail—moving from simple e-commerce to immersive ecommerce—, interactive brand engagement, and digital games. It may also be helpful for virtual events in order to get participants closer to one another and create an experience that’s more similar to in-person attenRoxana Memetea, DDB & Tribal Romania

dance, with an emphasis on engagement and the feeling of being present. However, she doesn’t foresee a bigger or different impact than other hot trends from the past have had on advertising agencies. Roxana Memetea is happy to see that advertising people have the

chance to be small pioneers in building this new world and she is quite sure that it will be extremely important in any communication strategy within a couple of years. “My colleagues have already had the opportunity to work on a big launch in the Metaverse this spring, and it was amazing. It was a global project, yet I understand it was well received by the young Romanian generation. Also, judging by the most awarded campaigns at the international creativity festivals, I would place my bets on the Metaverse.”

How to choose a brand ambassador

The best way for a brand to boost or refresh its image nowadays may be through an ambassador. As more and more business transactions are being conducted online, the consumer journey is getting increasingly fragmented, so having a strong brand ambassador programme is proving to be an important part of any marketing campaign.

By Romanita Oprea

Alina Galeriu - Olteanu, Galeriu & Partners Mih Lovin, Le Squad

Lately, brands have been associating themselves with influencers or public figures who share the same values in order to create alliances designed to boost the images of all parties involved. But when in a brand’s journey is it the right moment to choose an ambassador, and why? According to Sinziana Focsa, strategic planner at Oxygen, a brand is a conceptual entity—a story. To make this story relevant to other people and get closer to them, marketers strive to make it as human and relatable as possible. “Selecting a brand ambassador can be a powerful tool for this endeavour, especially when building brand awareness or when trying to expand to new target segments. A clear common set of values with the brand, influence on the core target, and a clean track record are three mandatory aspects. Other criteria—such as being a close representation of the brand persona or being relevant for a communication territory—depend on the brand and the brief,” Focsa noted.

Adding to that, Alina Galeriu, general manager at Galeriu & Partners, believes that a brand needs a variety of ambassadors throughout its history, for different stages of its evolution. We live in a fast-paced, always connected world, and brands must be present in the lives of their target audiences in various ways—or face oblivion. “How can you remain visible and relevant for your target? With the help of others who are talking about you. These are your brand ambassadors, whether they’re loyal consumers who simply recommend the brand to their friends and family or an influencer creating online buzz about the brand and recommending it to their community,” Galeriu argued. The criteria she and her colleagues keep in mind when recommending an online brand ambassador for brands in their portfolio are: affinity to brand core values, authenticity in their communication style, an overall balanced approach in their online discourse, and of course, metrics related to their potential to reach a big audience, to generate engagement and conversions for the brand.

“Brand ambassador-based influencer marketing is not recommended in the very beginning, but it should be something that brands get to in time, after having deployed other tactics. Before hiring brand ambassadors, brands should test the waters of what handling influencer marketing actually feels like from a business perspective: is it efficient? How different is it from other marketing tactics? Is the influencer you’ve chosen the right one? Are they responsible enough? Who is their manager and can that

person vouch for the professionalism of the campaign implementation? Will the influencer and the management team see the real responsibility the brand takes while handling the campaign?” said Mih Lovin, creative partner at Le Squad.

When it comes to criteria for choosing ambassadors, Mih Lovin says that the first filter should always be the relevance of the influencer considering what the brand/business is representing and implicitly selling. It should take into account the age and demographic of the creator and whether those are on par with the brand’s target audience. If targets align, it could be a good match. If they don’t, it could be a way to test out new audiences.

“Another criterion should have to do with the influencer’s position in the popularity chart. Are they at their all-time high? Are they heading towards that point on a winning streak or is the influencer in a decline towards lower numbers (in terms of notoriety, reach, engagement). One should see each influencer campaign as an investment—not so much in financial terms but more in terms of growth, awareness, and legitimacy. Due diligence is a must. One must know whether the influencer has ever experienced backlash or has been cancelled in any shape or form, and more importantly, understand how they and their management team managed that situation. This could shed some light not only on the beliefs of that influencer but on how that team manages damage control in different situations. Maturity and hedging against critical situations should be key factors,” Mih Lovin noted.

Influencers are popular because, in essence, they are special people who effortlessly share their lives with their online audience. But special people tend to be spontaneous and perhaps difficult or focused on sharing more rather than sharing better. “It is important and less of a liability if the influencer is represented by a manager or team of managers (agency) so that the urge to share is never more important than the appropriateness of what gets shared. And that is what you may want from a marketing campaign. At the end of the day, a brand ambassador collaboration with an influencer implies that they must maintain a moral mindset and a proper business attitude throughout the collaboration and afterwards,” Lovin added. But as pointed out by Madalin Munteanu, communication manager at Pandorra Story Style, there is no single perfect time to choose an ambassador. It depends on the situation and on the brand's desire to communicate around a particular topic. Some might go their whole existence without working with ambassadors, while

others might need more than one key opinion leader. “There are two main criteria which are very important when we choose these collaborators: the first one is to see whether there is a match between the way the brand usually communicates and the influencer’s positioning on social media—whether these fit together. The second one is the influencer’s reputation. It’s critical to work with someone who believes in the product,” he argued.

Is it always about a client-brand partnership? And should it be? “In the matter of selecting a long-term ambassador, the brand comes first. It’s in the client’s best interest

that we act as brand guardians and prioritise a partnership based on common values and quality content,” said Oxygen representative Sinziana Focsa.

“Continuity is a plus. It boosts the authenticity of the brand testimonial when it’s

Madalin Munteanu, Pandorra Story Style

coming from an influencer that constantly uses and recommends the product or service in question,” argued Alina Galeriu, while Mih Lovin noted that brand partnerships can be punctual with specific on-point deliveries from the influencer’s side, on a particular timeline: influencer posts X times on platform Y, on the topic Z, on days K and L. “This is the most common type of influencer marketing campaign, and it makes up the highest share of campaigns inside talent management agencies. This type of campaign aggregates content from 2-3-4 influencers or more,” Lovin said.

On the other hand, he also pointed out that brand partnerships with a brand ambassador-type collaboration imply that the creator is going to be dedicated to that brand for a longer period. These are usually oneyear or even longer-lasting collaborations. “The underlying implication of this type of campaign is that the influencer not only leverages their own audience to advertise the brand, but that on top of that, the brand uses its own media outlets, budget, and campaigns to advertise using the influencer’s image rights. This is a pivotal change in terms of how the actual campaign is thought out, budgeted, and handled.”

Yet, according to Madalin Munteanu, it’s important to find the middle ground and try to see what’s best for each brand. Sometimes you can really end up doing too much. Sinziana Focsa, strategic planner at Oxygen Ioana Cebuc, Himalaya Romania, Bulgaria, and Serbia

“WE ARE CONNECTED TO THE LATEST TRENDS ON THE MARKET AND WE ARE ALWAYS TRYING TO UNDERSTAND THE WAY OUR CONSUMERS THINK AND WHAT THEIR NEEDS ARE. GIVEN THE LATEST ECONOMIC TENSIONS, PEOPLE ARE NOW CHANGING THEIR PRIORITIES AND THEY ARE BEING MORE CAREFUL WITH THEIR BUDGETS IN ORDER NOT TO OVERSPEND, AS THEY ARE STRUGGLING FINANCIALLY, SLIGHTLY WORRYING ABOUT THEIR JOB OR NOT WORKING AT ALL.

OUR CONCLUSIONS AFTER HAVING OBSERVED THE MARKET SITUATION AND OTHER BRANDS’ COMMUNICATION APPROACHES ARE:

• MEASURABLE METRICS ARE REQUIRED AROUND ETHICS AND SUSTAINABILITY: SELLING THROUGH JOY, NOT FEAR • FOCUS ON SIMPLIFICATION; OVERCONSUMPTION IS OUT • IN CRAZY TIMES, CONSUMERS LOOK FOR POSITIVE, FUN, AND PLAYFUL MESSAGING • DAILY ROUTINES & TASKS CAN BE TURNED INTO FUN ACTIVITIES BEING CONSCIOUS OF THESE POINTS ALLOWS US TO CONSOLIDATE OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH CONSUMERS AND TRANSFORM THEM INTO BRAND AMBASSADORS. WHEN WE’RE TALKING ABOUT BRAND AMBASSADORS, WE’RE ALSO TALKING ABOUT ONLINE INFLUENCERS, WHO ARE EXTREMELY IMPORTANT NOWADAYS, AND CAREFULLY PICKING THEM TOGETHER WITH OUR AGENCY DEPENDING ON: THEIR AFFINITY TO THE BRAND’S CORE VALUES, THEIR AUTHENTICITY IN COMMUNICATION, THEM HAVING A BALANCED APPROACH IN THEIR ONLINE DISCOURSE, AND OF COURSE METRICS RELATED TO THEIR POTENTIAL TO REACH A BIG AUDIENCE AND TO GENERATE ENGAGEMENT AND CONVERSIONS FOR THE BRAND.”

FDI to GDP ratio: how well is Romania doing?

Foreign direct investments in Romania are still developing stably in 2022 When researching a country's economic performance, one of the indicators we should explore is the foreign direct investments (FDI) to GDP ratio, which compares a country's fund inflows to its gross domestic product. The new economic context redraws the map of the world's best FDI performers relative to the size of their global gross domestic product (GDP).

By Claudiu Vrinceanu

Romania ranks in the top 10 globally and 6th in Europe in Investment Monitor's 2022 Inward FDI Performance Index, which measures a country's inward investment levels against its gross domestic product (GDP) based on new greenfield projects. This means that with a score of 4.4, Romania received more than four times its fair share of inward greenfield foreign direct investment compared with what could be expected given its GDP level.

The Inward FDI Performance Index examines the number of inbound FDI projects in each country as a share of the world total. The result is then divided by the country's GDP as a share of world GDP. If the resulting value is a number greater than 1, it indicates that the country is receiving a higher ratio of inbound greenfield FDI than one may predict, given its economic contributions to the global economy. For comparison, Singapore has a score of 4.9, Finland gets 3.7, and countries like Poland and Ireland score 3.6, based on data presented by Investment Monitor.

Why is it important to understand how foreign investments evolve alongside economic growth and GDP? Foreign direct investment indicators—such as financial flows, investment positions, and income flows—are not components of gross domestic product. A set of normalised ratios may be calculated comparing these indicators to the GDP, thereby permitting a comparison of results between economies of different sizes. The resulting FDI intensity ratios provide one means for assessing investment integration within the international economy.

LEVERAGE FOR NEW FOREIGN INVESTMENTS IN ROMANIA

Foreign direct investments in Romania are still developing stably in 2022, despite the economic uncertainties. They amounted to EUR 4.37 billion in the first half of this year, up 21.4 percent compared to the same period of last year, according to data from the National Bank of Romania. Furthermore, in the first six months of this year, the number of companies with foreign capital that were newly established in Romania increased by 35.1 percent compared to the similar period of 2021, reaching 3,476 units.

Currently, the Romanian state has only one lever to support foreign investments in Romania, namely the state aid scheme for investments with a significant impact on the economy, a project coordinated by the Finance Ministry. This programme has attracted the interest of many international companies, especially those in the automotive industry, such as Star Assembly, Continental, and Renault. With the RON 1 billion budget increase for this project between June 15 and July 26, 2022, from RON 6.38 billion to 7.38 billion, there was growing demand for investments higher than EUR 1 million. The evaluation of these grant requests is based on the following criteria: investment value, type of initial investment, location of investment, profitability of turnover (in the case of active enterprises), amount of subscribed and paid capital (in the case of newly established enterprises).