The Flemish government investment company PMV has acquired a 30% stake in Deme Blue energy, the affiliate of the Deme dredging group specialised in seeking alternative sources of energy in sea water.
The Ghent-based Vlerick management school, one of the world’s leading business education institutions, is to open a campus in downtown Brussels in September 2012 to expand its activities. The school already operates a campus in Leuven in addition to its headquarters in Ghent.
The Brussels-based materials and non-ferrous metals group recently inaugurated its new €25 million battery recycling unit in Hoboken. With a capacity of 7,000 tonnes a year, the plan is to process up to 150,000 electric vehicles, or 250 million mobile phone batteries.
The Erembodegem-based producer of corrugated board and cardboard is investing €30 million to build a plant in Leinefelde, Germany, its third in the country. The new unit, to come on stream in 2013, will use recycled fibres and will help strengthen VPK’s position on the German market.
The country’s second largest mobile phone operator is investing €36 million over the next two years to renovate its network and implement equipments compatible with the fourth generation of mobile phones.
French venture capital group Astrance is paying at least €11 million to acquire the ailing Oudenaarde-based Santens textile group. The move is expected to save the Santens brand, which carries a long reputation for quality. Astrance is expected to keep 200 of the company’s 430 employees.
The Thalys high-speed train will link Brussels Airport to Paris in 1h47 from 30 October. The move will allow French passengers to connect with the Brussels Airlines African network and Jet Airways routes to Asia and the US.
The total liquid assets of the Belgian population topped the €900 billion mark last year, according to the Roland Berger Strategy Consultants group. This amount, which excludes property, is almost triple the country’s national debt of €357 billion. As a result, the Belgian population is among the wealthiest in Europe, after residents of Switzerland and Luxembourg, and is believed to be the eighth richest in the world.
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