February the 7th, 2022 - The Croatian King ICT company's system will protect no less than NATO from the ever-present threat of cyber attacks.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Darko Bicak writes, although the Croatian defense industry has a relatively modest range of deliveries to its clients within NATO, the IT sector has been strongly involved in a number of projects and tenders of the North Atlantic Alliance for many years now, the most recent example being the Croatian King ICT company's contract. This Zagreb-based company delivered and implemented to NATO's Communications and Information Agency (NCI) an advanced solution in the field of cyber security with their entire IT infrastructure, worth a massive 7.8 million euros.

The biggest project so far

As reported by King ICT, the company has delivered its largest international project to date in the field of cyber security in full, within the budget and ahead of schedule.

“The SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) solution is a key system for more successful defense against cyber attacks and will be used as part of the services that NCI provides to NATO. More than 40 experts have worked on this project, and that included the delivery and implementation of an advanced SIEM solution in the field of cyber security with a complete state-of-the-art IT infrastructure. Like all major NATO projects, this one required a very high level of expertise and commitment in areas such as project management, implementation and management of all aspects of quality, logistics, support, demanding testing and knowledge transfer,'' they explained from the Croatian King ICT enterprise.

They added that SIEM is an area of ​​computer security, where software products and services combine security information management and security event management. They provide a real-time analysis of security alerts generated by applications and the network hardware. In its announcement, they pointed out that the delivered SIEM system will significantly raise the security level of the organisation and contribute to the protection of NATO's critical data and communication system.

An extremely successful year for this Zagreb company

The Zagreb-based IT company noted that last year, still marked by the coronavirus pandemic, was extremely successful and that they expect revenue growth of more than 10 percent than the year before, when their revenue amounted to 636 million kuna, which could bring them closer to their record results from back in 2018, which stood at a very impressive 817 million kuna.

“Our overall business focus remained on the complete digitalisation of key customer business processes through the delivery of our own solutions and professional services on the most modern technological platforms of global manufacturers. We're locally present over on the Benelux market and we're strengthening our position here on the regional market. We've increased our capacities and abilities to provide services within the XaaS business model and the number of services on our own platforms that we offer to the market,'' they stated from the Croatian King ICT company.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

February the 5th, 2022 - The replenishment of the Croatian Aircash wallet via the Paysafe platform is now available in twenty different countries, but ironically NOT here in Croatia, where the Aircash app was created and developed.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Ivan Tominac writes, the Croatian fintech Aircash and the multinational online payment platform Paysafe have concluded a cooperation that allows Aircash wallet users to top up their wallets directly with cash in more than twenty countries across Europe, from Austria to Sweden.

When they want to add cash to their account, Croatian Aircash wallet users choose the "cash" option as a top-up method. This generates a barcode that can be taken to a nearby Paysafecash payment site to fully complete the transaction.

As Udo Müller, the CEO of Paysafe's eCash department, explained, the partnership between the Croatian Aircash application (app) and the Paysafe platform gets to the very heart of the problems faced by very many migrant communities. This approach allows people to digitise their money and transfer it much more easily, which helps them support their families back at home.

“This is especially useful for those who live abroad and who want to send money to friends and family at home. By enabling them to top up their accounts with cash through a reliable solution such as Paysafecash with a wide network of payment points, we make this service more accessible to our customers,'' said Hrvoje Cosic, President of the AirCash Management Board.

Although the Republic of Croatia is currently not among the countries covered by the cooperation, the international Paysafe survey from 2020 shows the state of awareness regarding cash. As many as 50 percent of respondents still believe that cash is the most reliable form of payment in a crisis, and 72 percent said they would be worried if they could not access cash.

For more, check out our dedicated business section.

February the 4th, 2022 - The Osijek company Orqa has begun developing no less than a chip design ecosystem right here in Croatia. Namely, Orqa, Osijek's FERIT and Zagreb's FER signed an agreement on cooperation in the project of designing a specialised chip for unmanned systems.

Complex chip design such as this hasn't existed in the Republic of Croatia so far, and it is on the basis of an initiative through which the rapidly-growing Osijek company Orqa d.o.o. further seeks to advance first-person (FPV) and remote reality (RR) technologies.

The goal of the Memorandum of Understanding signed by Orqa, the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computing and Information Technology in Osijek and Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Zagreb, is the joint work of experts, engineers and academia on research and development of technologies of strategic importance for digital and a more resilient European Union (EU).

As such, for the implementation of this initiative, the signatories of the Agreement will also promote a key strategic instrument for the implementation of the EU industrial strategy - Important Projects of Common European Interest (IPCEI).

“We intend to design a chip specialising in unmanned systems such as drones, vehicles or vessels, with the ability to upgrade to autonomous functionalities. This extremely complex project is the first project of this type in all of Croatia, we're among the first in the world, and currently there aren't enough engineering capacities for such a design.

Although this sort of staff is currently lacking here in Croatia, through this project we're trying to build capacities and train engineers in order to start the development of the chip design ecosystem in Croatia in accordance with global trends. Cooperation with faculties as staff generators plays a key role in this. Through this project, we intend to achieve a symbiosis of commercial needs on the one hand, and academic knowledge and research on the other. In addition to the aforementioned faculties, the support of the Ministry of Regional Development and EU funds is extremely important for us in order to pave the way for the further development of this attractive industry,'' said Srdjan Kovacevic, co-owner and CEO of the Osijek company Orqa. 

As a world leader in the development of video glasses for drone pilots and as a leading regional company in the drone industry, Orqa is rightly considered a leader in Croatian modern technology and innovation. This isn't a surprisie at all when one considers the research, development, and prototyping of devices in the field of first-person view (FPV) technology, remote reality (RR), video signal transmission and radio communication, and the production of electronic components and devices the company engages in - the most famous of which are video goggles for FPV drone pilots. Collaboration with STEM studios is a great opportunity both for young engineering hopefuls and for the entire technology sector. The signed Agreement is unique on the territory of the Republic of Croatia, and with it the City of Osijek and Osijek-Baranja County will be more strongly positioned in the demanding IT world.

"This agreement will further strengthen the cooperation between the two leading Croatian faculties in the field of chip design, to which the Osijek company Orqa is adding additional value. Here in Croatia, the development of the semiconductor industry is lagging behind other branches of electrical engineering, and the planned scientific research activities in cooperation with the economy will represent a significant step towards the development of microelectronics in this country. The implementation of scientific research will ensure the transfer of the latest knowledge in the economy, but also in study programmes, which will provide domestic students with additional competencies necessary for the labour market in this area,'' said Tomislav Matic, the Dean of FERIT.

In addition to FERIT, the great potential of the Osijek company Orqa was also recognised by the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing from Zagreb, which has long been positioned as one of the leading Croatian educational institutions in the STEM field.

"FER is committed to an economy based on knowledge, innovation and openness to global talent. The strength of any economy lies in the high-tech sector whose progress and competitiveness is impossible without knowledge and scientific research where the academic community plays an extremely important role. This agreement created the basis for the further development of Croatian competencies in the field of chip design and verification. The agreement is also key to connecting the Croatian academic community and the Croatian economy with major European players in the semiconductor industry and ultimately creating a consortium to apply under the Important Common European Interest (VPZEI) mechanism,'' said Gordan Gledec, FER's Dean.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

February the 3rd, 2022 - Croatian designer Marlena Dapcic is working on the designing of the most luxurious yacht ever to be constructed here in Croatia.

As Jutarnji/Novac writes, after graduating from the Faculty of Industrial Design in Venice, young designer Marlena Dapcic has already developed her career abroad working for other companies.

However, a few years ago, Marlena Dapcic decided to focus on her design studio and on Croatia, within her own company A.D. Group, with which she's carried out several notable projects and brought elements of ''real'' yachting into domestic shipbuilding practice. Yachts Croatia spoke to her in Split, where she is working on two new fifty-metre yacht projects and putting together some ideas for the future.

''My colleagues in Italy are famous designers and engineers, but nobody here knew me. At the beginning I was ''the one who chooses the colours'' and they called me in for interior design, although I started from an office where we did everything for smaller boats, and in the meantime I upgraded my knowledge, in Croatia we started all over again, from the beginning. In a few years, I managed to become recognisable, both as a designer and an engineer in one. The difference between a classic designer and my office is that we make a complete product. This way is quite similar to the mentality that the Croatian people have learned, that an engineer who has completed shipbuilding works on the design and everything else.

However, working in this way, the exterior design of existing projects hasn't progressed, so I started working on the interior and exterior design, with maximum effort to work with Croatian engineers who have a lot of experience, such as Vinko Strizic and Branko Vukovic. But they lack what I learned about design and materials in Italy,'' explained Marlena Dapcic.

''When I initially came to the shipyard with my construction plans, I wasn't accepted, partly due to the ignorance of the workers and my colleagues. It's paradoxical that at the same time, we have a profession which is done abroad for a lot more money, and they're much more valued over there, who wouldn't want that? Here in Croatia I have to constantly fight, which benefits me because I study, but it's very difficult to fight against the existing system, and the workers are older. I don't work as a classic designer, I had to give up that concept, but investors come to me and approach me as if a house is being built, not a ship, with all its requirements. Real designers often work for themselves and simply sell their concepts or work for a shipyard,'' added Marlena Dapcic.

''I was initially alone in A.D. Group, and since I only have two hands and one head, we had to increase the team, today there are four of us, there's my sister Helena who is an architect, one of my colleagues is an external collaborator and at the same time works for Fincantieri, and one of us is renderist who makes videos and renders,'' said Dapcic, who pointed out that it isn't a coincidence thay they're doing all this in Split, as two yachts are being ''born'' here under her supervision.

''On these two projects, we did the exterior and interior design, architectural plans and 3D renderings. The first yacht is ICY, and it's a new brand that will be heard about a lot more. The first yacht in the series is a fifty-metre mini cruiser, which should have the characteristics of a yacht, but it has fifteen cabins, and its own norms and rules of passenger ships, which are very strict. But the look will be at the level of yacht quality, unlike most existing ''winged'' mini cruisers. It can also be built as a yacht with six cabins, with an identical or similar external appearance.

On the other hand, the 46-metre yacht for which we're starting construction has a completely opposite logic. They opted for the concept of a real yacht with six cabins, but with masts and a slightly more classic look. We conceived it as a yacht ''from head to toe'', but with conservative and simple solutions in exterior design because we don't want to take risks with complicated shapes, but instead adapt to the construction possibilities that exist in steel and aluminum.

Marlena Dapcic added that it will be the most luxurious yacht built in the Republic of Croatia so far.

''It's characterised by clean exterior lines and a wave motif that is repeated both on the outside and on the inside, as two units which are connected by design. Inside, we used onyx with backlighting and lots of innovative materials, with the presence of proven materials like alcantara and fabrics that give the yacht a feeling of warmth, a ''clean'' design with white surfaces and gold details predominates. It's a yacht which weighs 499 tonnes, with a lot of space that we carefully arrange, and it's being built with a class for ''unlimited navigation'', for which the designer Vinko Strizic is in charge, by order of the investor,'' Dapcic stated.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

February the 2nd, 2022 - The Croatian Photomath app has been a roaring success, having gained a lot of recognition very quickly. The team behind it have now launched an interesting engineering blog on the popular blogging platform Medium.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Lucija Spiljak writes, the Croatian Photomath app has launched an engineering blog on Medium, an online platform with more than 100 million readers, where all those interested in getting better acquainted, as they say, "with life in the company" and everything they work on, can read about the ins and outs.

The creator of the Croatian Photomath app which works to help solve mathematical problems has announcing that they have something new in the works for months now, and their blogging project has now seen the light of day.

“We wanted to create a space where we can share our knowledge and experience with the community and show how, why and what engineers at Photomath do. We're going to write about how we work on our products, projects and technologies, and we can expect stories about #LifeAtPhotomath and interesting engineering topics at least twice a month,'' they announced from Photomath.

They currently have twelve active authors, and training is being prepared for a dozen more. So far, five topics have been published.

In one of the texts, Petar Alilovic, Android Tech Lead, presented Photomath's current news, revealing, among other things, that the users of the application are not only students but also parents and teachers. Last year, 5 percent more parents and 13 percent more teachers used this impressive maths app.

Among students, it is most often used by high school graduates, but it seems that after high school they stop using it, unless they choose a profession related to mathematics. According to data from last year, the Croatian Photomath app has been downloaded more than 220 million times worldwide, of which ten million users use the application every single day for various purposes.

According to Photomath's founder, Damir Sabol, the market potential is in a billion students who have to learn mathematics during their mandatory education and sometimes beyond it. Their largest market is across the pond over in the USA, followed by Russia, Italy, Brazil and Indonesia, while here in Croatia, they interestingly don't have as many users as they have abroad.

Last February, the Croatian Photomath app secured a massive 23 million US dollar investment from the American fund Menlo Ventures to further develop the app.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

February the 1st, 2022 - The Croatian company Agrivi is set to take to the demanding and much sought after American market, according to founder Matija Zulj.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Lucija Spiljak writes, founder and CEO of the Croatian company Agrivi Matija Zulj said that he's happy to announce the opening of Agrivi's office in the United States, where the highly experienced industry leader Bob Westbrook will work on their team as the sales manager. The Croatian company Agrivi, an agrotech company, has otherwise had its eye on the market of the USA for a considerable amount of time.

So far, they have already collaborated with the American company Driscoll’s, the largest berry producer in the world, and this will be Agrivi's fifth office after the ones they have in Zagreb, London, Bucharest and Warsaw.

Zulj pointed out that their US office wants to provide even greater value to its existing customers on the US market and thus remain a favorite digital partner in agriculture to large US and global agricultural and food companies in the transformation of agricultural production.

In addition to all of the above, they want to strengthen their market position as a global leader in software solutions for the digitalisation of agriculture. Namely, their software is among the top ten solutions in the agrotech industry in the world and among the top three in Europe.

It is estimated that the social impact of the Croatian company Agrivi directly and indirectly reaches more than 100 million people, and users from all over the world use Agrivi's solutions to optimise their agricultural production or the production of subcontractors.

There is a growing interest from investors on top of all of that as well. Around one month ago, the Feelsgood fund announced that it was investing 5.6 million kuna in Agrivi. This closed the funding cycle that began back in 2020.

The Croatian company Agrivi already has two open positions across the pond in the United States - for Executive Director of International Sales and Customer Success Manager.

For more, check out our dedicated business section.

January the 31st, 2022 - Croatian startups have come up with an incredible idea - the development of special smart glasses which allow the deaf and hard of hearing to ''see'' the words they're unable to hear.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Lucija Spiljak writes, among the global companies that presented their technology solutions in Las Vegas at the world's largest consumer electronics fair - Consumer Electronics Show (CES), there were several Croatian representatives among more than 2,000 companies from across 160 countries.

In addition to Iron Bull, Orqa, Sportreact, Codelab and Zuluhood, two Croatian startups created in Novska at the Pismo Business Incubator - Grow and Hiroma Design - presented their innovations and products, as well as their further business plans.

"We want to achieve our goal - to help deaf people see all of the words they can't hear," said Josipa and Kristijan Bencek, who officially launched the Grow startup two years ago after completing their gaming training at the Pismo Business Incubator. They developed a prototype of VOICEE smart AR glasses for the deaf and hard of hearing, which they presented at EES Hearing at the recently held CES in the US.

"These are glasses that generate sound into text and print it in real time onto the lenses of the glasses in the form of subtitles or subtitles. When you look through these glasses, you feel like you’re watching a foreign movie. We've been researching and developing VOICEE for the last two years. We worked on the development in collaboration with deaf people, associations, as well as with hardware development experts. It's a very extensive and complex project. We currently have a functional prototype, but we're still working on improving it every day. We'll soon launch a Kickstarter campaign so that our second prototype can be released on the market,'' revealed Josipa Bencek.

Presenting the product among the largest technology manufacturers in Las Vegas was a significant experience for the Croatian startup Grow, which, as Josipa said, motivated them to present their product to the best of their ability, as well as to network and find potential partners for their further work.

"Regardless of the technology presented at CES, there was really great interest in our smart glasses. Continuous visitors around our exhibition space soaked up our every word. We were a little surprised ourselves, but it gave us a spring in our step and an incentive to do more work. We stayed in touch with some of those people and we believe that some of them were also our potential investors,'' said Josipa.

A wave of positive change

Grow is based on gaming, but also products that are related to gaming, and aren't exclusively games. Josip and Kristijan swam into the often challenging entrepreneurial waters with the desire to start a wave of positive changes in their environment and to prove that even in challenging times - they can still achieve what they want.

The support of Novska's Pismo incubator was important for them, where they had access to mentors, various workshops for improving entrepreneurship and better networking. Through the Crown project organised by the Sisak-Moslavina County Development Agency with partners from cross-border cooperation, Grow won the award for one of the best entrepreneurial ideas.

"When we talk about games, we're based mostly on augmented reality, or AR. Given today's ubiquity of technology, we use games for educational purposes, as entertainment, but also for the promotion of certain products and companies. The success of the games in these fields has been proven many times not only by us, but also by trends from outside Croatia. In addition to games, we also offer gaming education. We educate children and adults on how to produce video games and introduce them to the gaming industry. We've developed education in two fields. The first is programming, where students learn the basics of programming and the use of programming tools that are adapted to their age group. The other field is graphics. Participants in this training learn how to create graphics, animations or models that are used in the production of games, so they can implement their own ideas into the game and thus completely personalise it,'' explained Bencek.

Of the projects related to gaming, their educational game for Lonjsko polje with an emphasis on indigenous animals stood out the most. There are two of them in the team, Josipa and Kristijan, but they're also cooperating with associations and experts from various fields, and with the increase in the volume of work, they expect employment to begin shortly.

Their clients come from various fields of business, and so far they have worked for A1 Telekom/Telecom, Hrvatska posta/Croatian post, Coding Giants, the Simora agency, and Lonjsko polje itself. They are also cooperating with some foreign companies and Croatian franchises, and they believe that there will be more because they are still young in the market.

"This year has just begun, but we've started it in full swing. With education, games and VOICEE, we expect this year to be even more successful in business than last year. Our next big goal is the success of the Kickstarter campaign, and our further steps are focused on the successful completion of the projects we're working on and even more successful agreements on new projects. We also hope that we will be recognsed by foreign investors and with our personal development we'll start the development of new people in our community,'' concluded Josipa Bencek.

When it comes to other Croatian startups, Stefan and Mateja Vedrina founded the Hiroma Design startup three years ago, in which they create video games, 3D projections and augmented and virtual reality applications. They especially stood out with their educational application for children, Moopies, on the topic of waste sorting and environmentally positive behaviour, which they presented at CES.

"It's true that children today spend a lot of time in front of screens, but in our application we have a solution to this problem. The focus of the Moopies project is an educational application for children in which children learn without even being aware of it. The innovation of our product is that we put the child in the position of a teacher, not a student as is the practice in our competition. Moopies are cute little monsters that fall to planet Earth, and a child embarks on a learning adventure with one of them. The child, along with a Moopy, then learns about the knowledge of our planet like maths, foreign languages and colours. As the Moopy learns, it evolves. When downloading the app, the parent determines how long their child will play the game.

After this period, Moopy, with whom the child is currently playing, goes to sleep and they can continue the game only the next day. In addition, the application will be accompanied by content that is thematically related to the application, ie merchandise; soft toys, a catalog with pictures, tablet pens, and T-shirts,'' Vedrina explained.

Hardworking and ambitious Croatian startups

They added that the reactions of visitors at CES gave them additional motivation and self-confidence, and they were approached by numerous distributors, potential associates and investors.

“We're already working with some distributors to distribute our merchandise. We received some great feedback and interest from all age groups and occupations. The visitors were also delighted because the application uses augmented reality so that 3D models of the Moopies can be seen through the screen of the device above the thumbnails in the album,'' pointed out Stefan Vedrina.

He and his wife Mateja decided to venture into the world of Croatian startups after completing a six-month training session in video game production - Unity and Blender - in order to move more easily in the foreign and domestic markets of the gaming industry. Prior to that, Stefan completed his studies at the Technical Polytechnic in Zagreb, while Mateja received her Master's degree in sculpture from the Academy of Fine Arts, and switched from traditional sculptures to digital ones. Today, Stefan is the main programmer at Hiroma Design, and Mateja is the main 3D/2D artist.

Although the two of them are the only employees, they're working with eight other experts on their current Moopies project, and as the project is extensive, they plan to hire more people to complete the necessary staffing for further development. So far, their focus has been mainly on the domestic market, but they are increasingly expanding beyond the borders of Croatia, where, as they pointed out, they are becoming more and more recognisable.

Their clients are mostly cities, institutions and associations, but they also have a few private clients in the form of companies. At the end of last year, they agreed on work related to the production of video games and augmented reality applications that will be used in some cities in Croatia.

For more on Croatian startups, check out Made in Croatia.

January the 28th, 2022 - Croatian Mabrouk products are winning over the hearts and wallets of both Germans and Swedes, and it was only thirteen months ago when they first launched their cosmetic product line.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marta Duic writes, Tamara and Zoran Rebic from Veliko Trojstvo in Bjelovar-Bilogora County produce mare's milk, and they started doing so because of the respiratory problems their two sons suffered, as following the consumption of that milk they successfully alleviated their issues.

In addition to selling both fresh and frozen mare's milk, they also produce cosmetics with it, which made this young family a pioneer in the production of cosmetics of this particular animal origin in Croatia.

“First, a mare’s milk soap was created that delighted our friends, and then a cream that won people over with its beneficial effect on the skin. In the further development of other products, we had the help of experts and pharmacists who brought the recipe to perfection. That's how the natural cosmetics with mare's milk from the Croatian Mabrouk company were created, which was named after our stallion, Mabrouk Amor,'' revealed Tamara Rebic. Today, they have five products in the Croatian Mabrouk assortment - cream, shampoo, soap, balm and lotion, and there are fifteen horses living on their seven-hectare property, which includes a stable and pastures.

“There is a lot of work to be done on the farm, but we want to continue taking care of the horses and dealing with the milking process itself. We produce the mare's milk ourselves and process it into powder through the lyophilisation process. Considering that we made larger lots and quantities of cosmetics, we agreed to cooperate with another company that manufactures cosmetics, which only made doing business easier. This year past year was full of surprises for us, as only thirteen months ago we launched the first cosmetic product line. It was a long-term process that lasted more than a year. When our products passed all the necessary analyses, we started selling them on social media.

Since the coronavirus pandemic closed many doors in terms of sales at that time, we created our own webshop, which proved to be a very effective way to communicate with customers and sell Croatian Mabrouk products,'' they explained.

Even though the coronavirus pandemic is now no longer what it once was owing to the advent of the vaccine, their web shop is still up, running and working hard, and in addition to small specialised stores selling domestic products, Croatian Mabrouk cosmetics has also established cooperation with the giant retailer dm.

As Rebic pointed out, their customers are all those who appreciate and love natural cosmetics.

''We get a lot of orders from outside Croatia, from countries such as Germany, Austria, Sweden and Ireland, so our plan is to cooperate with several stores with natural cosmetics,'' concluded Tamara Rebic.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

January the 25th, 2022 - The popular Croatian Highlander brand, which offers a special experience for all lovers of walking, climbing and mountaineering, has spread from Croatia to as many as fifteen different countries, including the United States of America, which the creators say was a real achievement for them.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marta Duic writes, the very special mountaineering experience created by the Croatian Highlander brand originated in Croatia back in 2017 and has since expanded to 15 countries around the world. This year, it is heading across the pond to the United States.

The USA is the world's largest market for long-distance mountaineering, which is a great achievement for this brand, and at the same time an opportunity to promote Croatia even more loudly.

"Launching into the American market is our biggest victory and a turning point in business because it's the strongest market in the world, but also a market that needs a focus on health and care for nature. The first event we launched will be in California, in the Big Bear Lake region from September the 27th to October the 2nd, where we expect participants from over 40 countries to join us,'' explained Jurica Barac, the director of the Croatian Highlander brand.

The event over in the USA is the result of the strategic partnership of the Croatian Highlander brand with the American event company Spartan Race®, which they concluded last year. The main goal of the partnership is to break Highlander into the world's largest markets in the event industries such as the US, the UK and even China.

It's worth noting that the team of recreational mountaineers and nature lovers from Osijek is responsible for the creation of this mountaineering adventure, as they recognised the beauty of Croatia in its mountain peaks and paths.

This expedition had its premiere on no less than the famous Velebit, and today, the Croatian Highlander brand has versions in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Austria and Greece, while last year Morocco, Portugal, Macedonia, Spain, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Slovenia joined the list, as did Russia and Egypt.

Back at the beginning of pandemic-dominated 2020, the license for the Croatian Highlander brand was sold to Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Austria and Greece, which made Highlander Global the umbrella organisation that oversees the brand's entry into existing and new countries as franchisors. In addition to more sales, the main focus of this brand will be to help organise events for partners who have purchased a license.

''In addition to expanding and developing more, we also plan to talk to potential investors for the project, which we believe will lead to a 50 million US dollar annual revenue deal by 2025. In five years, we want to be present in at least 50 markets across the world and have more than 350 events globally,'' concluded Barac.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.

January the 24th, 2022 - Koogle blown glass from an area of Zagreb called Gornji Stenjevec is making a comeback. This old family craft which was once one of very many dotted all over the capital, from shoe repairs to key cutters, is returning in the digital era, and taking full advantage of that.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Lucija Spiljak writes, once upon a time, the City of Zagreb was a city full of crafts, where everyone could sew trousers and make tailor-made shoes with guaranteed quality. Today, we're sadly witnessing more and more padlocks being forever placed on the doors of the once esteemed crafts. That said, some are still resisting these harsh, new times of mass production.

Among them is Koogle blown glass, a trade for the production of blown glass items in Gornji Stenjevac in Zagreb. It is a family glass-blowing craft which is almost 60 years old, run by Martina Simunkovic. It used to be a glass-blowing oasis, where, after the Second World War came to an end, about 200 households worked for a cooperative that would buy their products and place them on the market.

However, when it was extinguished not so longer after in the 1950s, the same fate befell the small workshops. Martina's grandfather was among the last to continue his work, and eventually, he was the only remaining one. In addition to glassblowing, in the late 70's and 80's, he also introduced machines for the production of ground plastic items.

The business was then taken on and continued by his son, Martina’s father, and back in 2014 she brought the craft back to life, as the third generation of glassblowers in the family. Today, she makes various decorations using the technique of heating a hollow glass tube and blowing air out of her mouth.

By profession a historian, artist and ethnologist, she previously worked as the head of the Department for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage at the Ministry of Culture.

“Art historians and ethnologists are always attracted by passion and hunger for beauty, and glass is an ideal medium where as a creative, I can express myself and make an object not only interesting to me, but something I'd would buy myself. For the last 15 years, our craft has been ''asleep'', so to speak. With the advent of large shopping centres and retail chains, the need for handmade products has sadly disappeared; there's now mass production and it's all imported and in other forms. We couldn't compete with that, so my father closed the business down,'' Simunkovic revealed.

Back when she worked in the aforementioned ministry, she was aware of the value of traditional crafts, but also how endangered and unstable the micro market is. However, she noted that customer interest in handmade items was beginning to return.

"Decorative items don't really have an essential function, people buy them for details and aesthetics. I realised that customers were starting to turn more to these products and that there were more and more small family stores out there on the market that started offering these items from local workshops. That's where i saw an opportunity to revitalise the Koogle glass blowing family business I grew up with, which would also satisfy my desire for creativity. I suggested to my father that we see how the market goes, and he was delighted when he pulled out some glass after a long time, quickly remembered everything and returning to his old routine. He taught me all of the techniques, and then in 2014, the story began again.

We've adapted to the market and to the wishes of our customers, but the backbone of our craft has remained the same - minimalism in decoration and natural and ecological materials. There are few of us glassblowers who make hollow blown glass products and decorations related to seasonal periods. Mine were exclusively Christmas decorations. It was hyperproduction, the whole family was involved, along with some outside glass blowers. The market was the former Yugoslavia, and some was exported elsewhere. We had enough customers considering the production capacity, a series of 100,000 pieces. We were based primarily on and around Christmas. At the end of the year, we had to sell what we'd produced throughout the year,'' Martina recalls.

Today, the largest concentration of Koogle blown glass' production is set aside for Christmas decorations, because that particular festive period is the most commercially viable for it. Considering that so far everything in the trade is done within it, their capacity is smaller, but they do try their best to cover the seasonal demand. Martina therefore decided to supplement the assortment, so she has different decorations for Easter as well.

The Koogle blown glass team also offers terrariums where plants can be grown, and Martina even joined the O2 Project, which aimed to raise awareness about forest conservation, and her creations proved to be the ideal incubators for seed growth and development. Today, her products are ordered by private individuals, but more and more, she says, she notices that companies need them at the time of giving gifts to their employees, partners and clients, with numerous inquiries for personalised gifts.

There is interest from outside of Croatia and the former Yugoslavia as well, and she is currently in negotiations with the European Entrepreneurship Network run by the Science and Technology Park of the University of Rijeka, which would connect her with potential associates and clients outside of Croatia and its immediate region.

For more, check out Made in Croatia.