According to the PAIiIZ and Hays Poland report: “10 years of BSS in Poland”, 56% of companies providing modern services for business (BSS) in Bydgoszcz specialized in IT services. Next to Rzeszow (44%) and Katowice (38%), the city boasts the largest number (55%) of workers employed in the IT centers.
There are more than 5 thousand people working in Bydgoszcz shared services centers. So far, companies with Polish capital invested here the most. Currently 24 entities from the services sector operates in the city and 14 of them are companies with Polish capital. They generate nearly half (2,120) of employment in Bydgoszcz BSS sector. On the other hand, more than 2.5 thousand jobs in local centers of modern services for business were created possible thanks to the centers with French capital, which are the largest foreign investors in the city.
Polish cities are perceived by potential BSS investors as very attractive due to the significant competitive advantages, such as good communication and technical infrastructure, access to skilled workers with specific language competence and specialist knowledge, wide range of modern offices, good cooperation with local authorities and high quality of life.
As noted by Iwona Chojnowska-Haponik, Director of the Foreign Investment Department of the Polish Information and Foreign Investment Agency (PAIiIZ), entrepreneurs though rarely indicate investment incentives as a key element to make the final investment decision in favor of the location, it is a matter of public assistance that almost always appears during the negotiation process – ‘This could be due to the fact that individual branches of large corporations operating worldwide are fighting for a given project, which allows for a very precise analysis of competing locations, including assessment of the possibility of obtaining additional sources financing’ – explains Director Chojnowska- Haponik. This trend confirms that the companies specializing in modern services for business (BSS) , among others, investing in Poland are interested in applying for the available support instruments.
The data collected in the report summarizing 10 years of BSS in Poland, show that companies are most interested in obtaining support in the form of non-repayable grants. They are willing to invest in special economic zones (SEZ), which allow them to benefit from the exemption from income tax. – ‘Businesses also expect so called “soft incentives”, including the professional service when making an investment decision, support in the recruitment process, facilitate collaboration with universities, and help to increase recognition of the company in a given market’ – says Ewa Koruba, District Manager at Hays Talent Solutions.
Bydgoszcz increasinkonferencja prasowagly meets these expectations and attracts investors by offering advantages sought by the company. Bydgoszcz is the largest city in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian with the International Airport, which serves almost 290 thousand passengers per year. There are important agglomeration within 200 km as Poznań (142km), Łódź (167km) and Gdańsk (167km). ‘The development of the BSS is closely linked to the availability of staff and the conditions for doing business. Every year the job market gets more than 11 thousand well-educated, young people, of which approx. 2.3 thousand are IT , economics and foreign languages philology graduates’ – says the Mayor of Bydgoszcz Rafał Bruski. ‘Local developers offer modern office spaces, while we provide professional and comprehensive services for all stages of the investment process’ – adds Edyta Wiwatowska, CEO of the Bydgoszcz Regional Development Agency.
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Poland, from the location novice in the business services sector (Business Services Sector BSS), has become a mature market where 23 different cities gather nearly 660 Polish and foreign companies, employing more than 150 thousand people. 11 cities can boast a number of centers of more than 10 entities. They are: Kraków, Warsaw, Wrocław, Łodź, Upper Silesia, Tri-City, Poznań, Bydgoszcz, Lublin, Rzeszów and Szczecin. Centres located in these cities employ in total almost 98% of all workers in the industry.
Companies in the business services sector (BSS) are divided into in terms of their services four main categories in terms of services provided:
BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) is a solution consisting in the job performance of business processes to third parties. Providers of such services in Poland include activities such as customer or HR and payroll services. A single center of this type in Poland employs an average of up to 328 employees.
The second type of companies are SSC (Shared Services Center) – shared service centers created within a single corporation, which is also the largest employer in the sector. In Poland, these types of centers employ more than 57.5 thousand people.Other companies in modern business services sector provide services in the area of widely understood IT and generate 23% of employment in the sector.
The last category includes research and development (R & D), which focuses on the development of products, applications and software. The world giants such as Samsung Corporate ( Warsaw), Mentor Graphics (Katowice), Nokia Networks (Wroclaw), or Motorola (Krakow) have invested in the R&D centres, which account for 11% of all business service centers in Poland.
