Marta Śniegocka talks to Sebastian Aran Araya, Managing Director, 3M Poland.

You are at the head of 3M Poland since April. What’s you aims for the next years?

We have a couple of priorities for Poland in upcoming years. One of them is to continue growing in a domestic market. We have a large business opportunity in a domestic economy in Poland. Secondly, we plan to invest in our manufactory footprint in Wrocław, not only for Poland but also for a whole world. Third one is to invest in innovation in Poland, in our local capacities.

What is currently your capacity in Poland?

Today, we employ around 2000 people. We have 4 big manufactory sites. The biggest one is in Wrocław and we call it manufacturing superhub. We have our headquarters in Warsaw. We also have our one research and development lab, also in Wrocław.

You’ve mentioned investments in Poland. Do you plan to build new plants or enlarge existing one?

Both. So far, we have invested in Poland around 400 million dollars. Now we work on a details, but for sure we plan to develop new factories in Wrocław’s superhub and expand current factories.

Can you share some details of those investments?

Unfortunately, for now I can’t share final numbers and details because we’re still working on them. I can just tell that site in Wrocław will continue expanding some capacities. We also have a lot of other ideas.

Some of 3M Poland’s factories are located on a Wałbrzyska Special Economic Zones. Since 1 of July 2014, incentives and tax exemption in SEZ will be diminished. Is it any obstacle for 3M?

Not at this time. We always observe what’s happening in local and European environment but we haven’t changed our plans towards investments.

3M often mentions that innovation is one of a company’s objectives. How many R&D Centers do you have in Poland and what was a purpose to set up CTC?

We have one laboratory and CTC in Wrocław which is connected to the global net of labs and CTSs. CTC is a space where we can show with our customers and distributors what we do and how we do it.

Poles are often complain about lack of innovation in our country. What is yours and 3M point of view?

I see this discussion in economy and also on a governmental level of how support innovations in Poland, e.g. what kind of incentives is the most effective. But innovations is not only about money or direct investments but about environment. In my opinion, a challenge is not only to have a public investments but also innovations of private companies: large but also medium and small.

Other problem is a collaboration of business with universities. Do you work with some of them?

We work with some, but not in a very strong way. This is one of our goal for upcoming years to be more open to collaborate with universities, startups and other R&D centers.

Do you think that our universities teach students to be innovative or should change its programs to be more flexible?

I think that universities programs are correct. We are very positive about talent we are getting from universities in Wrocław. Most of the people we hire are Polish engineers and for now are getting enough talented people.

And what is the biggest challenge for 3M in Poland?

To continue growing in a domestic market and expanding our capacities locally. We are not facing any issues, so the challenge is our own capability.

You used to work in Chile. Do you notice many differences, cultural and in a way of doing business?

I see many similarities. Both countries have 25 years of recent democracies, both countries are considered an emerging markets. From social stand, both countries have young, ambitious people, in a positive way.

And do you think that are any enterprise management from Chile you can implement in Poland?

I would like to say something deeper, but Polish people can be pretty emotional like Latin Americans. This is something what I need to be aware of on a daily basis