As Novac/Filip Pavic writes on the 24th of June, 2019, Mate Rimac, the founder of the Croatian supercar company Rimac Automobili and Prime Minister Andrej Plenković met in the afternoon a couple of days ago in Banski Dvori. During their 45-minute-long talk, which was also attended by Economy Minister Darko Horvat, Rimac agreed with the prime minister for him to finally pay a visit to his facility in Sveta Nedjelja near Zagreb.
Since Prime Minister Plenković has not yet visited Rimac’s supercar factory, he has three-hour tour awaiting him on Friday, and there will also be a presentation on how to attract investment and improve the economic climate for investment in the Croatian car industry. Along with Prime Minister Plenković, Minister of Labour Marko Pavić, Minister of Economy Darko Horvat and Finance Minister Zdravko Marić confirmed their planned arrival to Sveta Nedjelja, and the arrival of Education Minister Blaženka Divjak is also possible.
This delegation of the Croatian Government will meet and list, first of all, to the experiences of investing in Croatia from Rimac’s prestigious shareholders, made up of representatives of international automotive companies including Porsche, Hyundai and Kia, who have invested 100 million euros in Rimac Automobili over the past few years. Listening to their stories will hopefully be a wake up call for the group of politicians.
In addition, Rimac will share the likely damning results of an intensive two-year study, which analyses why Croatia lags so miserably behind other nearby European countries when it comes to the car industry, and why so many rounds of investment in that field over the past few years have totally, and intentionally, bypassed the Republic of Croatia.
The recent meeting between the two is the result of a multi-month agreement between Plenković and Rimac, which Jutarnji list recently covered, stating that Rimac was finding it all but impossible get an actual date for a meeting with the prime minister. A fact much of the public were unhappy with the HDZ leader for, especially given the positive publicity and investment Rimac has brought to Croatia.
”They know about my ideas. I’ve already mentioned them on a couple of occasions. I want to present them to the very heads of the government, but we’ve not been able to sort a date out yet. I gave them some dates over the next two months when I’m available and I’m waiting for their response as to when Plenković can come and see the presentation,” said Rimac back then.
Despite the fact that Plenković hasn’t visited Rimac Autmobili yet made little difference to Rimac’s personal and professional drive, the innovative Croatian entrepreneur didn’t hang around waiting for his arrival.
Back in May, he published nineteen measures to develop the car industry in Croatia at the Croatia E-mobility Forum. He let the Croatian Government know that we could have up to 50,000 new jobs in that industry alone, as well as the equivalent of nearly half a billion dollars more in the budget, enough for “one and a half Pelješac bridges, 23 university homes, or 53 schools” had Croatia set its sights on that type of investment at the correct time, just as other countries in the vicinity, such as the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary already have.
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