Dear readers,

The figures of Greek antiquity are still alive even today. Their names sound so beautiful: Prometheus, Orpheus and Eurydice, and the daughter of the Phoenician King Agenor, Europa, after whom our wonderful continent is named. We at VGP feel committed to this place called Europe.

We consider ourselves to be a pan-European company and believe that Europe is worthy of further advancement.
Here, it is possible to make something new and pioneering from the relics of the past, a vision to which we have dedicated ourselves at VGP. Therefore, we recently expanded into additional European countries and extended our presence to include France, Greece, Denmark, Sweden, Serbia and Croatia. In these and many other European countries, there are numerous abandoned industrial wastelands that are virtually begging to have new life breathed into them. There are already fantastic examples proving that this can be achieved.

One of these trailblazing projects is in Bilbao, a Spanish industrial town that was almost “dying” at the end of the 1980s. About 25 years ago, the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum opened there with great courage. The building, created by star architect Frank O. Gehry, has become a symbol of Bilbao and has given a new face to the city that once seemed lost. Many trendsetting investments followed, and an enormous appreciation for this city arose. Such transformations can also be achieved through inner-city industrial and business parks that are developed sustainably with regard to demolition, climate neutrality and traffic concepts and that can be used in multifunctional ways. We at VGP believe this is the vision of the future, and this is where we see our role.

Therefore, we are increasingly investing in brownfield sites, such as in Heidelberg- Wiesloch or the one that was home to the former La Naval shipyard on the Bilbao estuary. This is how new industries can develop and new jobs can be created – an attractive prospect not just for potential employees, but also for business partners.

Furthermore, VGP aims to be a “home of expertise” even more in the future: a service provider and a first point of call for our clients. Both for the technical challenges that they face, and also to meet the requirements for green solutions.

The European Green Deal, whose goal is to make the EU climate-neutral by 2050, offers enormous opportunities here for our clients. Two of the sectors in which investments should be initiated as part of this European climate protection law are the building sector and mobility. Through the renovation and transformation of buildings, including those of a commercial type, energy consumption and costs should be reduced. The introduction of cheaper, healthier and more environmentally friendly forms of private and public transport should also lower CO2 levels. We at VGP support this vision – it drives us. We know that this is the only way for our united Europe to be more competitive in the world.

This is an ambitious goal, and technically very demanding. In order to achieve this, we need lots of expertise at the company, so we have strengthened our resources further in recent months. We want to be able to provide our clients with potential solutions and assist them as a strong partner in the technical implementation of their own plans. All of this will help us to grow further, to find the right employees, and to enhance the trust in VGP even more.

My regards to all of you for a hopefully lovely spring,

Jan Van Geet