AMSTERDAM: The US and Canada are fuelling a record influx of foreign investment in the Netherlands.
Despite a fair bit of doom and gloom over global economy figures, foreign companies continue to grow and they continue to look at the Netherlands to help fuel that growth.
The Netherlands Foreign Investment Agency (NFIA), an operational unit of the ministries of Economic Affairs and Foreign Affairs, reported recently that it assisted in attracting 187 new foreign investment projects to the country, worth nearly $3.5bn in planned investment and creating more than 6,000 jobs.
And it’s North America that makes up the bulk of the investment; 70 projects and nearly $2.9bn in capital investment come from the US and Canada. Headquarters projects set the pace, followed by manufacturing and distribution centres, with functions including marketing and sales offices, service and data centres, and R&D facilities for sectors from IT and life sciences to the creative industries.
The Netherlands is clearly a business location of choice for North American companies,” said Jan-Emile van Rossum, Executive Director of NFIA North America.
Our technology strengths, innovative mindset, highly educated workforce and world-class transportation and technology infrastructure are attracting investments from some of the biggest names in business.”
Netflix, Stryker, Coravin, DoubleDutch and Medline are among the US companies that opened European headquarters in the Netherlands last year, while American Eagle, Expedia, Liquavista and Palo Alto Networks expanded operations and Ball Corporation and PPG Industries invested in manufacturing plants.
Google is also building a new $661m data centre in Eemshaven in the northern province of Groningen.
The single largest investment was from Canadian company Northland Power, which is investing nearly $1.8 billion in Gemini, an offshore wind park off the northern coast of the Netherlands.
