On the other hand, whereas multinational companies usually have offices in cities with about or more than 300,000 people in Romania, in Germany or Netherlands, major companies like Ericsson, Telekom and Vodafone have offices in cities as small as 30,000 to 40,000 people.
“The top four cities in Romania by number of people are also the top four by office space stock and number of students: Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Iasi and Timisoara. Then, even though Constanta ranks next by population and number of students, the only top ten city where we can talk about an office space market is Brasov ranked eighth by population and fifth by number of students,” said Simona Filip, Associate Director with the office space department of Colliers.
However, there is interest from companies for medium-sized cities:
“We’ve had demand for space in the following cities lately: Targu-Mures, Sibiu, Oradea, Bacau, Suceava, Buzau, Constanta, Craiova, Galati, Pitesti and Ploiesti. Since it’s most often about services centers doing call center, support, telesales operations, there aren’t many restrictions for selecting suitable candidates, even though the talent pool doesn’t seem as rich,” Simona Filip said.
Companies in Romania have started expanding to secondary or tertiary cities. After having announced major office space projects in Cluj, Timisoara and Iasi, now Sibiu, Brasov and Targu Mures have been put on the investment map and there is also demand for Craiova.
“The reason for the decision to open offices in cities that have yet to prove their potential is cost cutting first of all. Considering employees most often live with their parents and have lower living costs they can accept a lower pay than if they were living in a bigger city.”
There are companies going to secondary and tertiary cities and employing people in new centers, as costs have been rising in Bucharest, Cluj and Timisoara, ZF has found.
For instance, advisory and technology firm Capgemini has 50 employees in Suceava in the office at the Iulius Mall it opened in 2017 and plans to add more for a total of 160, while CGS Romania has 200 employees in Galati and 400 Sibiu.
Opel has 100 employees in a services center that has nothing to do with its local representative office and Stefanini has 60 employees in Targu Mures.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)