Emerson's Cluj factoryThe Timisoara-Arad-Oradea-Satu Mare-Cluj bordered area is located in the Northwesten part of Romania, closed to the Hungarian border. The motorway access of the location is solved by the Hungarian M3 and M5 motorways, and by the large-scale Romanian motorway developments in the future. International airports in Cluj and Timisoara provides more sheduled flights to the main European hubs.
Western Romanian electronics cluster
Leading companies
More OEM and EMS companies are present in North Western Romania. In the second largest Romanian city, Cluj, the US-based Emerson has a facility with 3,500+ employees, manufacturing gas regulators, electric equipment for explosive environments, equipments and devices for construction site facilities, high power electrical generators. The cell phone company, Nokia, just closed its Cluj facility at the end of 2011, and more than 3,000 well-trained employees lost their jobs. The Flextronics' factory in Timisoara has an emphasis on automotive, medical, industrial and networking market. At spring 2012, the US-based Plexus expand its Oradea activity, increasing local employement to 500 jobs.
Labour markets
Romania is regarded as "super low-cost" location. That's absolutely right in many cases: the annual gross salary for operators in electronics manufacturing industry is around €2,500, lower than in Coastal China. The union movements are generally weak in Eastern Europe, and almost not exist in Romania.
However, in some cases, like special technical, engineering skills etc, the labour supply can be very limited, and these key employees can reach a Western style wages. Notice: before the crisis, Oradea has the lowest unemployment rate in Romania.
Business parks
Based on CBRE MarketView, Timisoara, Arad, Cluj has a relevant share in Romania's 1.4 million sq.meter overall industrial real estate stock. Tetarom Inc. provides 3 business parks in Cluj: the Tetarom 1-2-3 have approx. 200 hectare industrial lands. Tetarom parks are focusing on high tech industries like IT, automation, robotics, and first of all electronics. The Freidorf Industrial Park in Timisoara, managed by the local municipality, provides a special low-cost land leasing for investors. The Euro Business Park, Oradea is also managed by the local municipality, and with its 121 hectares area, one of the largest business park in Western Romania.
The average rental fees for industrial manufacturing halls are between 3-4 € per sq.meter per month (3.3-4.4€ per sq.feet per year), following the Eastern European average cost level.
A short video about the end of Nokia's Cluj factory:
