Baltic, Forum, Lithuania, Markets and Companies

And as Mantas Katinas, General Manager of foreign investment development agency Invest Lithuania, explains, service centres in Lithuania have grown substantially both in scale and in the range and complexity of the tasks they do. “The service centres of international companies located in Lithuania have evolved dramatically over the ten years since their first inception in Vilnius,” Katinas points out.“From small company branches carrying out the simplest functions, they have grown into major service centres which conduct very complex operations, are responsible for key international functions and employ highly qualified specialists.  Lithuania, which competed in the international market for foreign direct investments in the service centres’ industry now tries to distinguish itself for and compete in competences.”

According to data from Invest Lithuania, the country currently has 52 service centres employing 12,380 people, confirming Lithuania’s status as one of the most attractive countries for service centres in the CEE region.

And this status has found international recognition in recent years. This year, Lithuania’s SSC sector won in 5 categories at the CEE Shared Services and Outsourcing Awards held in Warsaw. Vilnius won the main prize for the region, winning the title of most dynamically developing service centre city. Kaunas, Lithuania’s second largest city, was declared the best growing city. Danske Group IT Lietuva was awarded the prize for the best employer, and Nasdaq Vilnius Services received the awards for being the provider of the most unique services and the best new service centre in the region.

The Baltic SSC Conference will be held on 12-13 October. The conference will focus on the challenges faced by shared service centres in moving from low cost transactional activities to high value-added services, but also explore the future of the sector in the entire CEE, and the contribution of SSCs to the economy of the countries in the region.