Serbia's Minister of Economy Nebojsa Ciric signed Monday a contract with Muhlbauer from Germany on a new factory in Stara Pazova, which will be worth EUR 4 million and receive a EUR 500,000 grant from the Serbia Investment and Export Promotion Agency (SIEPA) to create 100 new jobs.

More than a half of those 100 employees will have academic education, because the plant will be making a sophisticated product that has never been made in Serbia.

The construction of the factory will begin in June and be finished in October.

Muhlbauer is a world leader in high tech production of chips for identification documents, said Ciric after the signing, adding that the company had already worked with the government in making biometric passports, personal identification cards and driving licences.

The minister pointed out that Muhlbauer has 7 plants in Germany, one in Slovakia and now one in Serbia.

Company's owner Josef Muhlbauer said the factory would cover 4,000 square metres and that it would not be the only Muhlbauer plant in Serbia.

President of the United Regions of Serbia Mladjan Dinkic, who attended the signing, said that Muhlbauer got all the necessary papers for the construction thanks to the Stara Pazova local authorities, who provided the land for the new factory for free.

Ciric and Dinkic later visited a factory in Nova Pazova, which belongs to the Danish pump maker Grundfos. The Danish company intends to take part in a SIEPA competition for subsidies in order to build a new water pump plant in Indjija.