Automotive Clusters - Network of South-East Europe

 The “Export promotion of automotive industry suppliers by the networking of the automotive clusters from the western Balkans”, is a project that was established within the Open Regional Funds for Foreign Trade Promotion in October 2007.

 The Open Regional Funds (ORF) are an instrument of the German Technical Cooperation aimed at developing regional cooperation and strengthening capacities for EU accession in the South-East European (SEE) countries. The ORF are established by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and are implemented by the German Company for Technical Cooperation (GTZ).

 The Project aims to improve the positioning of automotive industry suppliers from SEE in the European and global markets. The Project primarily targets SMEs that can integrate into supply chains of the international automotive industry and therefore achieve higher value added.

 Among other activities for promoting foreign trade in the automotive industry, the Project supported the establishment of this regional portal with the goal to increase the regional and international visibility of the automotive suppliers in SEE, and to provide opportunities for creating value-added partnerships.

 The Project is jointly implemented by the automotive clusters in the participating countries: Automotive Cluster of Bosnia and Herzegovina - ACBiH, Automotive Cluster of Serbia - ACSerbia, and Association of Automotive Industry of Macedonia, in close cooperation with clusters from the partner countries: Automotive Cluster of Slovenia – ACS and Automotive Cluster of Croatia – HAK.