Gyarfas Kurko, the 35 year old entrepreneur of Harghita who in the past 10 years has driven a plant on the verge of collapse to turnover worth above 10m euros with 160 employees, says the tough moments for the business have been almost each time generated by the lack of cash. Ten years ago, Gyarfas had the ambition to break up from the business controlled by his father, Arpad Kurko, and turn a nonperforming asset of Perla Harghitei plant into one of the biggest PET water bottlers on the market. Apemin Tusnad in 2009 generated 11m-euro turnover, on a market worth 200-250m euros dominated by Romanian-held companies. Looking back, Gyarfas Kurko says the business development strategy was a risky one. Still, the producer left problems behind in 2009 and the shareholder says medium-term development of the company will be fuelled by loans, as well.

"Because we started far behind competition and had no financial investors among our shareholders, we had a riskier development policy and resorted to loans, which turned out to be a real burden from time to time (...)," Kurko says. In early 2008, Gyarfas Kurko withdrew from the management of Apemin Tusnad. The rough situation of 2009 required him to get more deeply involved in the company's operations and collaborate more tightly with employees, but he did not go back to an executive position.

Gyarfas Kurko, the 35 year old entrepreneur of Harghita who in the past 10 years has driven a plant on the verge of collapse to turnover worth above 10m euros with 160 employees, says the tough moments for the business have been almost each time generated by the lack of cash. Ten years ago, Gyarfas had the ambition to break up from the business controlled by his father, Arpad Kurko, and turn a nonperforming asset of Perla Harghitei plant into one of the biggest PET water bottlers on the market. Apemin Tusnad in 2009 generated