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4 Socialite
Budapest Business Journal | Feb 28 – March 13
rides. BKV Zrt’s Tourism Division has similar offers. In the past few weeks, advertisements for the firm’s private bus service appeared several times in Metropol, a free newspaper. In 2013, revenues from the company’s private bus service were more than HUF 26 million, a 15% increase compared to the previous year. Yet that is a drop in BKV’s HUF 100 billion annual budget. Nor will it improve the HUF 6.7 bln
debt the company has run up. (BKV will try to recover some of this by issuing bonds, the company recently announced.) But while it may not help BKV get back into the black, the activity does improves the company’s overall image, believes Péter Kende, head of the private bus and nostalgia team. “A dominant player in public transport needs to appear in other areas as well.
These services are economic and help raise the firm’s prestige, which in BKV’s case is an important point.” Private bus services have long been present in BKV’s portfolio. The fleet includes panorama buses that clients hire for domestic and foreign city tours or transfers – the most frequent services. The tariff is HUF 295/kilometer plus VAT, to which highway tolls, parking fees and the driver’s per diem are added.Driving is what they
BOOK REVIEW
THE CLINTON POLITICAL MACHINE This riveting biography reveals the strategizing, machinations and last minute decision−making that have accompanied one of the greatest political comebacks in history. Hillary Clinton’s surprising defeat in the 2008 Democratic primary brought her to the lowest point of her political career. She had been vanquished by a much younger opponent with a message of change and a cutting−edge tech team that had run circles around her stodgy campaign. And yet, six years later, she has re−emerged as an even more powerful and influential figure, a formidable stateswoman and the presumed front−runner for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. The story of Hillary’s phoenix−like rise is at the heart of ‘HRC’, a fascinating political biography that journeys into the heart of ‘Hillaryland’ to discover a brilliant strategist at work. Masterfully written by two White House correspondents and based on more than 200 top− access interviews with Hillary’s intimates, colleagues, supporters and enemies, ‘HRC’ portrays a seasoned operator who negotiates political and diplomatic worlds with equal savvy. Loathed by the Obama team in the wake of the primary, Hillary worked to become the president’s greatest ally as their fates intertwined in the
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know best and BKV has more than ten years’ experience in the field. But competition is tough. Several firms specialize in private, party, hop−on/hop−off, city and guided bus tours, and surely have a bigger budget for marketing. The edge that BKV has on them, says Kende, in addition to driving experience and knowledge of the terrain, is the legal framework behind their operation that ensures there are no unpleasant surprises in store for clients.