BR turns 18 | Opinion. Bill Avery (founding editor): 18 years on, the light is bright in Romania

I am constantly in awe of the vibrant, thriving and new generation business community in Bucharest. I can’t tell you how proud I am that Business Review – with its digital, print and events platform – reflects, and continues to contribute to, this resurgence.

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For years, many of us in the international community viewed Romania as ‘needing’ things – ideas, investors, infrastructure, and political transparency. Now, just a single generation since the launch of Business Review, I feel it’s the West that needs Romania – we need the creativity, entrepreneurship, confidence and courage of its young, well-educated, digital-savvy class of millennials, whose stories we tell.

One thing that we always shared with this key demographic was optimism about the future. Despite the long bumpy road of political and economic upheaval in the past, I see the road ahead as secure and clearly on the upswing. Momentum is in our favor as the foundational elements of EU integration are taking root and business life rebounds.

You can find here all the information about the anniversary issue

We build on that foundation of optimism with the same perspective now as when we started in 1998 – to offer a standard source of unbiased, fact-based business information that wasn’t clouded by a particular political angle. We were equally tough on IMF and EU policies and restrictions coming from outside as we were on revealing Romanian corruption and patronage. We’ve been proudly independent all these years – since it’s the only way to ensure that we represent the views of many and not just the interests of a single business.

Having said that, it follows that we are continuously looking for ways to improve the quality of the products we have. We hope you enjoy our new design and we’re looking forward to hearing from you!