April 11 (SeeNews) - Bulgarian cloud-based, beehive-monitoring technology developer Bee Smart Technologies [BUL:BEE] said on Tuesday that it attracted HiPP Romania and Nestle Romania to its beehive adopting programme, following the launch of Romanian operations in late 2022.
In the first quarter of this year, the company developed a network of beekeepers, distributors and logistics partners that will allow it to focus on strengthening the brand and boost its local client base in the second quarter, Bee Smart Technologies said in a filing to the Bulgarian Stock Exchange.
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The scale-up picked Romania as the first step of its European expansion because of similarities with Bulgaria in economic and social conditions, as well as easier and faster distribution, the lack of clear competition, the market scale and Romania being among the largest producers of honey in Europe. Operations on the Romanian market started in November, with setting up a local team of three and signing contracts with nine beehive keepers. A localised website, pollenity.ro, went live in December, with over 250,000 visitors in the first quarter, with traffic of 10,000 to the company's online store.
Bee Smart Technologies raised 1.2 million levs ($669,490/613,500 euro) in its initial public offering in July 2022. Since then, its shares have dropped 23.6% below the IPO price of 27.50 levs apiece, for a market capitalisation of some 8.6 million levs, bourse data showed.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)