One Of The Oldest Investors From Germany Leaves The Belarusian Market
- 29.12.2025, 12:21
The company doesn't see any prospects.
Robert Bosch, one of the top 10 largest industrial conglomerates in Germany and one of the oldest and most loyal foreign investors until recently, is closing its business in Belarus. In the best years, the Belarusian market annually brought him up to 100 million dollars in revenue. The best years for Robert Bosch in Belarus ended with the war in Ukraine and sanctions. And now, as Plan B has learned, the Belarusian subsidiary of Robert Bosch, called "Robert Bosch," has filed for liquidation. The process started in late summer of this year, drawing a line under the more than 30-year history of the German group's work in Belarus.
With screwdrivers and love for the public sector
The industrial conglomerate Robert Bosch, which is among the top 10 largest businesses in Germany in terms of turnover and employees, appeared on the Belarusian market in the first wave of foreign investors. Almost simultaneously with "fellow countrymen" from Commerzbank, Carl Zeiss, Fielmann. Even before Lukashenko - in 1993.
The range of interests of the local "Robert Bosch" in Belarus covered several areas of the multi-profile group. For thirty years "Robert Bosch" has created a network of about 80 franchise service centers for car maintenance and spare parts sales. Through dealers, the company has established the sale of power tools, heating boilers and household appliances. The company tried to localize the production of branded vacuum cleaners at the factory "Midea-Horizont".
The state sector has always formed a significant part of the total revenue of the German group in the Belarusian market.
Robert Bosch entered the conveyors of Minsk Motor Plant, MAZ, BelAZ, MTZ, "Gomselmash", "Amkodor" and other leading machine-building enterprises with fuel, hydraulic and other equipment. Under state contracts, the company supplied video surveillance systems to the Minsk-Passenger railway station and arena covering system for the Belgos Circus, as well as equipped hockey stadiums for the Minsk World Cup 2014.
Without prospects?
In 2022, the management of Robert Bosch announced that it would stop supplying not only to Russia, but also to Belarus. Later, the Germans also demanded from local franchisees to dismantle branded signs and logos, threatening financial claims.
The daughter of Robert Bosch, as one of the shaft-forming industries of an unfriendly country, logically got on the Belarusian blacklist, prohibiting such owners to sell local assets.
The same list included more than 1.8 thousand other legal entities. But out of the first Dolukashenka wave of investors, Robert Bossych is actually one of the last ones who decided to put an end to official communications with local clients. Carl Zeiss, Fielmann and Commerzbank have already left the Belarusian market.
Official statements on the departure of Robert Bosch from Belarus have not been made. They are unlikely to sound. And it is unlikely that if they do sound, references to the war in Ukraine four years later will be appropriate.
Rather, the departure is an assessment by the company's experts of the prospects of the Belarusian market.
And they are such that there is no place there for Robert Bosch and other Western businesses. Everything - from washing machines to punches - is occupied by Chinese corporations. The same thing is happening everywhere as, for example, in the automobile market.
One of the most important clients of Robert Bosch (both on the assembly line and in the aftermarket) Volkswagen Group has been the leader in supplying new cars to Belarus for almost twenty years. According to the results of 2024, VW dropped out of the top-10.
Of the "Westerners" last year, only Audi - another client of Robert Bosch - remained in it (in 7th place). And there is a very high probability that we will not see this manufacturer there again according to the results of the outgoing year.