特別会員寄稿

New Approach of
the Czech Republic to FDI

海 外 直 接 投 資におけるチェコの 新 戦 略
Richard Schneider リハルド・シュナイダー

Director for Japanese Operations 駐日代表
CzechInvest -チェコ共和国ビジネス投資開発庁（チェコインベスト）

The Czech Republic is a well-developed country in theheart of Europe. It is only as big as the island of
Hokkaido and has the population of the metropolitan

both inflation rate and interest rates are stable at thetarget of 2%, and the unemployment rate is the lowest
in the entire Europe – 3.2%. Indeed, these economical

city Tokyo but it is an important export-oriented
economy and member of the European Union. Becauseof its long industrial tradition, favorable location,
considerable pool of skilled workforce and goodresults are a great advantage that makes people
satisfied with their living and working conditions ininfrastructure, the Czech Republic has been one themost popular European destinations for the foreign
direct investment for the last 20 years. In fact, Japanesecompanies have been the second biggest foreign
investors in the Czech Republic right after Germany.
Today, there are 260 Japanese companies having anthe Czech Republic. On the other hand, it brings aheadache to the employers who sometimes struggle tofind the workers, especially for the blue color’s
positions. It is exactly the time of stable economic
situation that creates the right conditions for the new
initiatives and strategies to be introduced by the Czech
government.

operation there. 109 of them are manufacturing
companies, the biggest investors among them are
Panasonic, Toyota Motor Corporation, AGC, Denso

Japanese investors play important role
for the Czech economy

and many other. The Japanese investors have invested
more than 430 bn. yen and created more than 50,000

30 years ago, in 1989 the communist regime in thenCzechoslovakia fell and the transition of the economy

new job positions.

started. The main goal of the new government was toliberalize the trade, to create an environment for
private ownership, and to switch from the planned
economy to the market economy. Comparing to other
Eastern European countries, the Czech transition story
was by far one of the most successful. There was a low

Outstanding economic results
In 2019, the Czech Republic shows rather impressive
economic indicators. The GDP growth stays at 2.8%,
図表１

安定した経済6.0％GDP growth
Inflation
Interest rates
Unemployment rate

5.0％
4.0％

transitions was the privatization of the state-owned
companies. Mainly German, French, British, Italian,
Austrian and American companies were the first ones
to come and to get the most attractive companies thatwere competitive enough to export to the Western

3.0％
2.0％
1.0％
0.0％

portion of companies that went bankrupt, theunemployment didn’t rise extremely and the Czech
currency stayed still as well. One part of this successful

2015

2016

2017

2018

2019
2020
forecast forecast

markets. The most outstanding example is the originalCzech car producer Škoda Auto which was founded in1895 and acquired by Volkswagen Group in 2000.
2019.545

The Japanese investors came a little bit later butwith even bigger eager. The Investment andDevelopment Agency CzechInvest was founded by theMinistry of Industry and Trade in late 1992, a coupleof months before the Czechoslovakia peacefully split
into to two countries – the Czech Republic andSlovakia. First greenfield investment was made by
Panasonic in 1996 and this was essentially thebeginning of investment incentives scheme in theCzech Republic. Since that time, over 100 Japanesecompanies decided to establish their manufacturing
facility in the country. The investment boom came
before the Czech Republic joined the European Union
in May 2004 which enabled the exporters to freely
enter the internal market of the EU.

studies, research institutions, private companies, startups and the foreign investors as well. It targets theintroduction and development of the key technologies
and smart solutions like robotization, digitalization,
smart mobility, alternative fuels, autonomous vehicles
or smart energy.
図表２

平均賃金はドイツの３分の１4,000€

Average Gross Monthly Wage

Nowadays, Škoda Auto manufactures more than 1
million units in Europe, Russia, India, and China everyyear.

4,500€
3,500€
3,000€
2,500€
2,000€
1,500€
1,000€
500€―€2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Western Germany

Czech Republic to become aninnovation leader by 2030
For the last three decades, the ultimate goal of theCzech government was to reach the level of wealth of
the neighboring Germany. Unfortunately, for the lastten years the wages remained at the one third of theGerman. Although the productivity grew faster than in
the Western European economies, the wages rose at
the same speed thus not closing the wage gap. As
mentioned before, the Czech government decided toenhance the development of the country by investing
more into the innovations. The innovation strategy
called “Czech Republic – Country for the Future” wasadopted earlier this deal to gather the initiatives under
the same roof. Its goal is to make the Czech Republic
one of the top 7 most innovative countries in theEuropean Union by the year 2030. It was inspired bysimilar innovation strategies conducted by Finland,Denmark, Sweden or Switzerland – countries of about
the same size of population yet far more innovativeand productive. Nowadays, the Czech Republic stands
somewhere in the middle in the ranking of European
innovation leaders. There are several instruments thataims to create a better environment for technical46

2019.5

図表３

Eastern Germany

Czech Republic

イノベーション戦略 ― 数値目標

Index

Now

EuropeanInnovation
Index

Goal by 2025 Goal by 2030

Moderate
innovator

Stronginnovator

Innovation
leaderGlobalInnovation
Index

No. 14among EUcountries

Top 10among EUcountries

Top 7
among EUcountries

Innovation
OutputIndicator

No. 13among EUcountries

Top 10among EU
countries

Top 7
among EU
countries

More favorable conditions for hightech investment
One of the ways how to reach the goal of being theinnovation leader is to attract high-tech investment andmake the existing manufacturing companies to invest
more into the implementation of principles of socalled “Industry 4.0”. The concept of Industry 4.0 or
as being referred to the fourth industrial revolution isto create a smart factory. It a name given to the trend ofautomation and data exchange in manufacturing
through introducing the robotization, digitalization,internet of things, cloud computing and other cyberphysical systems. This concept is becoming
increasingly important in the situation of the shortage

図表４

投資優遇措置の改正 ― 支援対象プロジェクトの種類

テクノロジーセンター
R&D センター

ビジネスサポート
サービスセンター（BSS）

１．シェアードサービスセンター
２．ソフトウェア開発センター
３．ハイクリペアセンター
４．データセンター

製造業

of labor force which is common in most of theindustrialized regions of the European Union.
The CzechInvest’s vision is to make the Czech

Amendment of the Act on Investment
Incentives

Republic open, economically advanced andcompetitive economy based on innovation and welldeveloped modern digital infrastructure, using highly
qualified human potential. The goal is to reach at 50%

The Act on Investment Incentives is about to beamended. The proposal brings more favorable

share of the high added value investment. CzechInvest

support services projects will be supported by cash
grants for each newly created job all over the country,
not only in the selected regions. On the other hand, theconsiders projects that either employs with high skilled
and/or invest in research and development or highlysophisticated manufacturing, as high added value

conditions to the above-mentioned higher added value
projects. R&D, technology centers and business

manufacturing projects applying for the investment

investment. These kind of investment projects will
receive considerably higher financial support from theincentives must prove the value-added condition andcalculate the benefits of the investment for the region.

Czech government. Mid-tech and low-tech will besupported only in the selected less developed regions.
The Czech Republic has introduced the Act on

製造業に最も重要な改正内容
高付加価値の条件の追加

Investment Incentives in 2000. This law secures fairrules and conditions for all the investors. It is one of
the main advantages of the investment climate in theCzech Republic because it brings high level ofcertainty to the foreign investors. Basically, once a
foreign investor fulfills all the conditions, it can be
100% sure of receiving the financial support in theform of investment incentives. The investment
incentives are available for all the companies who
invest in manufacturing, technology center, R&D
activities, business shared service centers, softwaredevelopment companies, data centers or repair centers.
They come in form of income tax relief, and in selected
regions with higher unemployment rate also in theform of discount on land price, cash grants on newly
created jobs and training, and property tax reliefs.

最低賃金が投資先地域の平均賃金以上であること＋Ａ）全雇用者の10％以上が大学卒業資格を保持および研究開発期間（R&D）とのアクティブな連携 ORＢ）全雇用者の２％がR&Dに従事 OR
Ｃ）対象経費の最低10％がR&Dへの投資
・10年間の法人税免除
・補助限度率：対象経費の25％

ご質問・お問い合わせは下記にお願いいたします。
チェコ共和国ビジネス投資開発庁
チェコインベスト
駐日大使館オフィスE-mail：tokyo@czechinvest.org
Phone：03-5485-82662019.547