Television and mobile-phone behemoth LG Electronics has picked Kobierzyce, near Wrocław, over London as the site for its first European research and development center. The facility should be fully operational within five years and its role will be to adapt LG’s product portfolios to the European market.

“So far in Europe there has been no center of R&D developed by LG Electronics,” daily Puls Biznesu quoted spokesperson Joanna Prasznic as saying.

“However, due to the need to better focus on the expectations of European customers, LGE decided to open a center in Europe. London and Kobierzyce were under consideration. We had a lot of visits by representatives of the group and recently made the decision,” she added.

The cost of setting up the center has not yet been revealed, but it is expected to employ around 300 researchers and engineers.

As of 2007, the European market accounted for 19 percent of LG sales worldwide. Its European network includes production facilities in two Polish cities, Kobierzyce, and Mława, located north of Warsaw.

This new investment could give a boost to Polish R&D investment figures, which are among the lowest in the EU.

The European Innovation Scoreboard ranked Poland 29th out of 35 European countries for innovation in 2009. According to OECD figures, the country only spent 0.6 percent of its GDP on R&D in 2008. This is only a fraction of the EU goal of an EU-wide three percent rate by 2020.