Two Romanian companies in Deloitte 2018 ranking Fast 50 in Central Europe

Romanian companies Trencadis and Mondly have made it to Deloitte’s 2018 Technology Fast 50 Central Europe, in the main category, Technology Fast 50 ranking, respectively in the Rising Stars category. Over 20 Romanian companies entered the competition for this year’s edition of the program that recognizes the most dynamic technology companies in Central Europe.

The technology company Trencadis, specialized in software solutions for the government and the business environment, is the top-ranked Romanian business, in 13^th place in the Fast 50 ranking, with a revenue growth rate of 730%. This is the fourth year that the company enters the ranking. Established in 2007, Trencadis currently operates in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Baia Mare and Oradea, and had a turnover of EUR 5.96 million in 2017.

The language-learning company Mondly, which created a platform that uses state-of-the-art technologies such as like chatbots with speech recognition, augmented reality and virtual reality to help people learn languages, has been recognized within the Rising Stars category, which marks younger businesses with minimum three years of activity and revenues of at least €30,000, which are ineligible for the main Fast 50 ranking, but have recorded such strong growth that they are likely to feature in the Fast 50 in years to come. Founded in 2013, Mondly is for the first time in the Fast 50 program and ranked seventh among the ten Rising Stars with a revenue growth rate of 854%.

“We are proud to see two Romanian companies making the top this year. This shows that the great innovative potential is brought into products and services, generating fast growing returns. The competition with Central European peers is very tough and those countries which will manage to turn into a technology hub will be the long term winners,” said Dinu Bumbacea, Consulting Partner in Charge, Deloitte Romania.

The Central European results

With this year’s edition, Deloitte CE Technology Fast 50 hit a new record of 1,290% average growth between 2014 and 2017 delivered by the companies featuring in the ranking. This is the third consecutive year that the average growth rate has broken through the 1,000% mark, once again highlighting the medium-term sustainability of Central Europe’s continuing tech boom.

The 2018 Fast 50 ranking is led by two Czech businesses which also featured in last year’s top five. This year’s winner is the 3D-printing company Prusa Research, with an impressive revenue growth rate of 17,118%, followed by the online flight-booking powerhouse Kiwi.com, last year’s winner, with a revenue growth rate of 14,377%. The third-placed participant is Croatia’s Q Software, a digital solutions provider. Slido, the Slovakian audience-interaction platform for meetings and events is the fourth-placed, followed by Pilulka, a retail pharmacy business from the Czech Republic.

This year saw the launch of the Social Impact Award, marking companies that contribute most effectively through their products or services to achieving at least one of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals 2030 (SDGs). The winner of the inaugural award is Poland’s Saule Technologies, which has developed the next generation of solar-panel technology, using a thin, flexible foil that can be wrapped around buildings.

The Most Disruptive Innovation Award, introduced by Deloitte Central Europe in 2016, recognizes the business whose inventiveness enables it to develop solutions with the potential to significantly disrupt established markets and value networks. Brolis Semiconductors, a high-tech company in Lithuania, won the award for the development of a non-invasive integrated laser-based blood constituent sensor. In 2017, the Romanian robotic process automation software company UiPath won a special distinction in the Most Disruptive Innovation category.

In order to be considered eligible for the main CE Fast 50 ranking, companies from hardware, software, fintech, telecom, media, environmental technology and healthcare and life sciences industries must meet several financial criteria, among which to have minimum €50,000 revenue in the first three years and a current year operating revenue (2017) of at least €100,000, be headquartered in Central Europe, and own proprietary intellectual property or proprietary technology. Winners are selected by ranking their revenue growth over the four years from 2014 to 2017.

Companies from ten countries are represented in the ranking. Poland leads in terms of number of businesses that entered the Fast 50 ranking, with 18 companies, followed by Lithuania, with 8, and Croatia and the Czech Republic, with 7.

Companies representing the software solutions sector dominate the ranking, with 32 entries, followed by media & entertainment businesses, with 11 companies, and hardware (7).

More information about the Deloitte Central Europe Technology Fast 50 programme is available here.

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