Indo Finnish bilateral Trade all set to increase

Similarly about 25 Indian companies are operating in Finland, With the recent visit of Finland’s prime Minister Juha Sipila on the sidelines of ‘Make in India’ event here and his meeting with the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi the bilateral trade between the Two countries is expected to increase significantly in coming days. Presently India is Finland’s fourth largest trading partner in Asia.

The main Finnish exports to India comprise electrical machinery along with machinery for special industries, and paper products. The Finnish imports from India principally include textile products, clothing and machinery instruments.

The biggest foothold in India is with software and technology companies. Companies operating in India include the mobile phone company Nokia, the data technology service company Tieto, the software company Basware, the data security company F-Secure, and the gaming company Digital Chocolate. In addition, many big industrial enterprises, such as the Stainless steel manufacturer Outokumpu , engineering company Wärtsilä, elevator manufacturer Kone, the forest products company M-real, the engineering company Metso, and the cargo handling equipment manufacturer Cargotec are already in the country.

Several Finnish companies are engaged in the renewable energy and clean-tech segments while a Finnish energy firm already owns two solar power plants in India and has won a bid to build a third one. A Finnish mobile phone network manufacturer has a research and development centre in India that employs 6,000 people and their equipment serve 280 million mobile phone subscribers.

The Indian companies in Finland are operating in diverse sectors including information technology, health and tourism and have promising prospects for enlarging their investments and involvement in Finland.

Mr Yatinder Pal Singh Suri, Managing Director and Country head, Outokumpu Finnish Stainless Steel major also met the Finland’s Prime Minister Juha Sipila during his recent visit in Mumbai.

“Despite several initiatives taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for ease of doing business including bringing in consistency, clarity and predictability in policies, other factors that further make it easier to start business in India include good language skills and a high level of education among the Indian employees with several high-ranked universities and institutes in the country” said Mr Yatinder Suri, India head of Finland’s stainless steel company Outokumpu who is an alumni of IIT –Kharagpur .

“India needs much high technology in every field. Infrastructure and the machinery industry are developing rapidly, so there is a big market there for Finnish companies ”, Mr Suri added.