“Bulgaria is the European gem many people are looking for. They just don’t know it yet.”
G Adventures blog recently published an article entitled “8 Reasons why Bulgaria is Europe’s next big thing.” The eight reasons by travel writer Robert Reid in included Veliko Târnovo, Plovdiv, Sofia, wine, the "Lord of the Rings” fort, the UFO building, the heavy metal beach town, and of course, banitsa.
“Bulgaria is the European gem many people are looking for. They just don’t know it yet. Part of the draw is the beauty of this last stop of the former Soviet Bloc to the south. There, the Balkans Mountains — called Stara Planina (or Old Mountain, locally) — crash into the Black Sea, near gold-sand beaches. It’s surprisingly exotic, too. It’s the birthplace of the Cyrillic alphabet, some villages speak Turkish only, and many locals still shake their head ‘yes’,” according to the article.
Bulgaria, as one of the most developed countries in the Balkans and in Europe, for a relatively long time has been known for its strategic geographic location. Being an agricultural country with a predominantly rural population in 1980s, Bulgaria has managed to transform into an industrial economy with a well-developed energy sector and ICT sector.
According to the president of Bulgaria, Rosen Plevneliev, Bulgaria can become an ‘engine’ and a regional information and communications technology hub in Europe. “We see ICT clusters as an important part of the development of the Bulgarian economy,” said Plevneliev during a meeting with the European Commission Vice-Precident for the Digital Single Market, Andrus Ansip in April 2015. During the meeting with Ansip, the president of Bulgaria mentioned the great progress of the Bulgarian ICT industry and mentioned Sofia’s third ranking in top European destinations for start-ups.
But we have to add one more reason why Bulgaria is becoming Europe’s next big thing: Ruse. The fifth largest city in Bulgaria, Ruse is known for its well-developed IT sector and that is one of the reasons why many ICT companies from all over the world are choosing Ruse nowadays.
Besides being the most developed industrial center in northern Bulgaria, is located only 1.5 hour drive from Romania’s capital, Bucharest. The city has a growing number of high-skilled software developers which is promising for Ruse becoming not only the main IT hub in Bulgaria but in the whole region.
According to an article published by Venture Beat last year, “Bulgaria has the highest average reputation among top users in the world.” According to the analysis, Bulgaria has a top user’s score of 57.21 per capita with 40 users that have a reputation of 5,000 or higher. “If you are top user in Bulgaria, chances are you a total Stack Overflow rockstar.”
Image Source: www.cedefop.europa.eu