Bogdan Gross, about re:innovation becoming a regional platform: „Technical expertise gets you through the door, but local culture dictates success”

From project delivery to regional platform. After several years of international projects, re:innovation, Romanian business consultancy and implementation company, has taken a new step in its evolution by establishing a local presence in Finland. More than a geographical expansion, this move reflects the company's long-term vision: building a regional ecosystem that combines local expertise, cross-market experience, and strong partnerships. In this interview, re:innovation CEO Bogdan Gross explains why local presence matters, what Finland brings to the equation, and how the company plans to grow across Northern and Central-Eastern Europe.

„International growth wasn't a master plan we drew on a whiteboard, it happened organically. We built a solid foundation in Romania by staying close to our clients and focusing on flawless delivery. Soon enough, those same clients and partners asked us to take on complex challenges abroad. We quickly saw that our hands-on approach and execution standards translated well across borders”, explains Bogdan.

The first major step in this transformation was proving that the company can deliver consistently outside Romania, turning international projects from occasional wins into core operations. „The real turning point, however, was recognizing that remote execution hits a ceiling. True scale requires real roots - local teams, local trust, and deep market fluency. Flying in for a project and flying out works for transactional consulting, but it doesn't build lasting capability. To drive real retail transformation, you have to live in the market, understand its nuances, and stay committed for the long haul”, explains Bogdan.

In the last four years, re:innovation learned a lot from international projects. This capability allowed the team to use the expertise across all markets. But even so, it wasn’t enough: „Technical expertise gets you through the door, but local culture dictates success. Understanding how decisions are made, what keeps executives up at night, and what «excellence» means in a specific market is 80% of the game”, says Bogdan.

And while the remote model is efficient, it has its limits, especially when it comes to building the same level of proximity and trust. “And in consulting, especially in transformation projects, trust matters a lot”, says Bogdan. And that’s why it’s important to have local people in those markets,, because there are things you simply cannot learn from a slide deck. Local people know the market,  the culture, they understand the pace, the expectations, the small details. And those small details often make a big difference.

The advantages for clients are multiple: they get an accessible, local partner who speaks their language and shares their reality. For the local teams of re:innovation, it means building something meaningful in their home market, supported by a strong regional spine rather than operating as an isolated outpost. “ Local expertise gives you relevance, and regional experience gives you perspective. When you put them together, you can bring ideas from one market to another without pretending that every market is the same”, explains the CEO of re:innovation.

re:innovation Finland, one piece of the puzzle

With this strategy in mind, expanding to Finland felt like a natural choice for the Romanian company, considering the strategic partnership with RELEX Solutions, the primary technology platform re:innovation implements across its projects. Finland is a mature market, with strong retail and supply chain capabilities, and also a market where quality really matters. “That fits well with the type of work we want to do. Also, after more than three years of working together with RELEX consultants, we got closer to the people there and started to see quite clearly that we share many of the same values: a practical way of working, respect for quality, and a very honest focus on delivering properly for the client”, argues Bogdan.

The founder also emphasizes that the Finnish market is demanding “in a good way” - which means that the clients know what they want, they value expertise, and they do not need a lot of noise around a project. They need people who know what they are doing and can deliver.  “We found an ecosystem that is serious, practical, and quite advanced. Retail and supply chain discussions are not superficial there. People understand complexity, and that makes the conversations much better from the start”.

But the main reason for re:innovation to make this huge step of entering the new market and opening a Finnish entity was the people. Over the last years years, the Romanian team had the chance to work with very experienced professionals who already know the space very well and who also share the same practical mindset. 

“When you find that combination, it gives you confidence.  Finland is not just another country on a map for us. It is an important part of how we want to build re:innovation as a regional platform. Romania gives us a strong delivery base, Finland gives us access to a very mature market, and together they make the model stronger”, shares Gross.

The Finnish team is made of senior people who have been around this type of work for a long time. They are not people who need a long explanation of what retail transformation or supply chain planning means. They already understand the reality of these projects.  They bring experience, credibility, and a very calm way of looking at complex problems. “That matters a lot. In our work, you do not need people who only sound good in meetings. You need people who can sit with a client, understand the issue, and help solve it”, says the CEO.

And while the Romanian team has a lot of delivery capacity, energy, and hands-on experience from many projects, Finland adds local seniority and market depth. It is not one team replacing the other; it is more like putting together two strengths. 

re:innovation, from project delivery to regional platform

When it comes to the values and the way of working that re:innovation wants to build and grow at a regional level, Gross says he wants to “keep it simple” - which means the trust, ownership, and good work are the key pillars the organizational culture stays on. “We do not want to build a heavy corporate structure. We want teams that have freedom, but also responsibility. People should feel that they are building something, not just joining another consulting company”. 

And this is the mentality for the whole company, not just the subsidiaries and the local markets. Because, again, Finland is one piece of the puzzle, but not the whole puzzle. The direction re:innovation is following is to build a regional platform with strong local teams in the markets where we can really add value. “We do not want flags on a map just for the sake of it. We want real teams, real clients, real work”, argues Gross.

Besides Finland, Poland, Estonia and the wider Baltic region are markets of interest for the company - where there are local colleagues already working on delivering international projects. “We will grow where the combination makes sense: good people, relevant clients, and a clear reason to be there.  For us, becoming a regional platform is not only about opening entities in new countries. It is about connecting people, partners, and companies that want to scale beyond their home market. I think this is where re:innovation can become useful in a broader sense, not only as a delivery partner, but as a platform that helps good teams and good companies grow internationally.”, explains Gross.

This can also mean helping complementary technology and solution providers expand into markets where re:innovation already has trust, relationships and local context. In this model, re:innovation acts as a connector between organizations looking to scale, innovate and learn from one another.

Another important direction is strengthening the company's presence further upstream in the value chain, by working more closely with manufacturers and FMCG companies. For Gross, the future of supply chain transformation is built on closer collaboration between retailers and producers, not on treating them as separate worlds.

This vision is also reflected in the company's broader approach to client relationships. Rather than focusing solely on project implementation, re:innovation increasingly emphasizes long-term value development through Continuum, its framework for continuous improvement, capability building and sustained business impact after go-live. The goal is not only to deliver successful transformations, but also to help organizations continuously evolve and maximize the value of their investments. “That is where long-term value is created, not only in one-off projects, but in the way clients keep improving and getting more out of what was built together”, concludes Gross.