The Costa Rican Electricity Institute (ICE) and Siemens Costa Rica S.A. yesterday signed a commercial agreement at the ICE head office in Sabana Norte, near downtown San José to define and delimit the terms for carrying out joint projects in different areas of the electricity sector.

“The agreement seeks to foster synergies, build on each other’s individual strengths and complementary services to take advantage of the position and the experience of each company,” said ICE in a statement.

The agreement was signed by Luis Pacheco, Electricity Manager, and Marco Cosío, CEO of Siemens Central America and the Caribbean.

“For ICE, this is a significant step in identifying strategic partners that allow us to develop new businesses and diversify the portfolio of services we provide to our clients, as outlined in our corporate strategy for 2014-2018,” said Pacheco.

For his part, Cosío said that, “We are pleased to be a strategic partner of ICE and contribute to the technological modernization of Costa Rica. Siemens is a global leader in the energy sector and is the only company with state-of-the-art technology for the entire energy value chain, from generation, to transmission and distribution. Our experience will enable us to contribute significantly to ICE and strengthen our presence and commitment to the country’s progress.”

Siemens was founded in 1847 in Germany and has operated in Costa Rica since 1956.

The commercial agreement facilitates establishing joint business opportunities using mechanisms that best suits the two companies.

Siemens AG is a German conglomerate company headquartered in Berlin and Munich and the largest manufacturing and electronics company in Europe with branch offices abroad.

In their 2015 Siemens in Costa Rica company report, Siemens said, “Siemens Costa Rica continues to be the main supplier of Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE), the country’s government-owned power utility.”

With 111 employees as of 2016 in Costa Rica, the subsidiary generated 47 million Euros in revenue.