The investment will create 100 new jobs in two years.
“The additional lines will be used in the manufacturing of inner boots and of other sporting goods because we want to integrate as many products as possible locally,” said Alin Fetita, chief executive officer of the Chimica group that includes Chimsport.
“We have successfully demonstrated higher competitiveness compared with Asia-Pacific and Western Europe so we want to boost local production. With new industrial programs in place, we relocated some of the production of our customers (on all business segments i.e.) to Romania.”
Chimsport posted RON71.5 million revenue last year, up almost 25% on 2013.
The company became a strategic supplier for Finland’s Amer, one of the world’s leading sporting goods manufacturers, in 2012. The Amer group owns brands like Salomon, Wilson and Mavic.
“We applied for EU funding for retooling and expanding the industrial capacity of Chimsport. We sought support for upgrades and got about RON3 million out of the RON10.6 million required by the project. We will go to banks for the rest of the money and also use some funds of our own,” Alin Fetita added. (EUR1=RON4.4104)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)