Lithuania’s Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius stated to the Public Radio on 6 October that Lithuania would like to position itself as a Nordic Baltic ‘Service Hub’. 

He explained in his interview ‘Same as the rest of the world, we may hope to see no economic downturns similar to the one observed at the end of last year and in the beginning of this year in future. Hence we are discussing a possibility for Lithuania to become a certain services cluster of the Nordic and Baltic region through the concentration of higher-level services centres in the country. An investment agreement, which the government and Barclays bank signed yesterday and under which the bank will move its IT services centre to Lithuania, is one of the first portents. There may be more of such opportunities.’

In his speech the prime minister clearly identified Lithuania as a part of the Nordic-Baltic region.  Mr Kubilius sees Lithuania’s role in the region as a ‘Baltic Sea Service Hub’.  He said in his speech; ‘Lithuania is part of the Nordic-Baltic region, Lithuania is part of the Nordic-Baltic economy. We have three regional benefits – 1) Scandinavian economies on one side, 2) more and more interlinked economies of three Baltic States; 3) and huge markets to the East, including the countries of Eastern Partnership.  That is why we are starting to position ourselves in medium term future as  “Lithuania – Baltic Sea Service Hub”.

Our main task now is to strengthen traditional competitive advantages and create infrastructure, which is needed for development into that direction and will help us to  be attractive for foreign investments. Services,  including medical services, innovative industry and clustered traditional industry – those are the fields we are going to become competitive in the region.

To confirm that we are not just talking, I want to note, that today Lithuania has signed Investment Agreement with Barcklay Bank on moving their IT service centre into Vilnius. And this is just the beginning.’

12th Baltic Development Forum Summit will take in Vilnius.