Invest in Wallonia

2010 : yet another successful year for foreign investment in Wallonia. In the previous year* :

• Wallonia attracted 2x as many foreign investors per capita than Flanders
• In spite of a massive slowdown in the inward foreign investment projects in Europe (-36%), Wallonia managed to score an all-time high : +42% (Flanders : -14%)
• Foreign companies tend to move their HQ away from Brussels and more in the neighbouring Walloon Brabant instead

Why is that?

Location, location, location.

As a matter of fact, if you look at the flight patterns, you will see that Belgium is exactly in the middle of a circle encompassing London, Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam.

That’s 400 million consumers within a few hours’ reach only thanks to the densest motorway and railroad networks in the world (including 3 high-speed train networks), 3 international airports and extensive waterways with 4 river ports including the Port of Liège (2nd inland port in Europe).

But it gets better:

• Unique multimodal logistics platform based at the TriLogiPort of Liège, at the heart of Europe’s “logistics banana”
• 130 state-of-the-art Business Parks home to more than 5000 companies
• 6 Science Parks directly connected to research centres, our 9 university centres and our incubators
• Property cost among the lowest in Europe with more than 4000 acres of land fully equipped and available
• Productivity 20% higher than the European average
• Multicultural, multilingual, skilled and available workforce
• Unique fiscal incentives : competitive nominal corporate tax, notional interest deduction, advance tax ruling, special expatriates tax regulation status
• Easy access to capital

And let’s not forget the best beers and chocolate in the world!

*Ernst & Young 2010 Belgian Attractiveness Survey