Selling into Hungary through distributors

How the market buys

Hungarian public procurement is run under one act, the Public Procurement Act (Act CXLIII of 2015, Kbt.), and through one electronic system. Ministries and central bodies, counties and municipalities, state hospitals and universities all buy through it.

The system is EKR, the Elektronikus Közbeszerzési Rendszer. The act defines it as the central procurement register and IT system that supports the electronic conduct of procurement procedures, operated by the minister responsible for public procurement, and makes it the single system to be used for procurement and concession procedures. Contracting authorities register in EKR, and the Public Procurement Authority (Közbeszerzési Hatóság) keeps its register of contracting authorities there.

The Authority also edits the Közbeszerzési Értesítő, its official journal, and publishes procurement notices in it. Its website offers searches of the journal and a notice-watch service, which makes it the natural starting point for following a category.

Hungarian buyers usually award to companies that can bid in Hungarian, invoice locally and deliver and service within the country. In our analysis of TED award notices for supplies (September 2026), 98% of the winners in the 2,082 notices from buyers in Hungary were companies registered in the country (96% across the 30 EU and EEA countries); those local winners include distributors and dealers as well as manufacturers' own local subsidiaries — see our methodology. A foreign manufacturer enters by being listed with them.

Lawful first contact

Hungary sits between the strict and the open countries, and part of the answer is unclear. What is clear: section 6(1) of Act XLVIII of 2008 on commercial advertising (Grt.) allows advertising to a natural person by direct contact, "in particular by electronic mail", only if that person has given clear and express prior consent. Section 14(2) of the e-commerce act (Act CVIII of 2001, Ekertv.) adds that an e-mail whose only purpose is to ask for that consent is itself electronic advertising. Breaches of section 6 committed by e-mail are handled by the National Media and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH) under section 24(4) of the Grt.

Section 6 speaks only of natural persons. For direct marketing outside its scope, section 162(2) of the Electronic Communications Act (Act C of 2003, Eht.) prohibits initiating contact with a subscriber who has declared that it does not wish to receive such contact, and section 162(3) forbids any marketing message from which the sender's identity cannot be recognised. Read together, the two provisions put a message to a company's generic address under an objection-based rule rather than prior consent.

The statute does not say in terms how an address such as firstname.lastname@distributor.hu is treated. The regulator NMHH does: its guidance says the law prohibits unsolicited electronic advertising sent "not to a company or contact person, but to a plain private individual". On that reading a business contact at a company is approached like the company, under the objection rule of Eht. §162(2), while a sole trader (egyéni vállalkozó), being a natural person, needs prior consent under section 6. Guidance is not a court ruling, so the cautious course is to prefer the generic address the company publishes, identify your company fully, offer a free way to object, stop at once if asked, and keep the contact's data to what the enquiry needs (GDPR). A letter by post to the managing director, a trade fair or an introduction remains the safest first step.

What local distributors expect

Hungarian distributors are relationship-driven and careful about the commitments they take on in public tenders:

• Hungarian-language documentation: technical sheets, instructions, declarations and price lists that can go straight into a bid.
• Conformity evidence for the category — CE marking, declarations of conformity, test reports — and any national registrations the product needs.
• A margin that holds after a competitive tender, a clear position on price changes in a multi-year framework, and payment terms that reflect public-sector payment practice.
• Reliable delivery and after-sales service in the country, with spare parts available for the life of the contract.
• A defined territory and an open conversation about exclusivity and direct accounts.
• Time. A personal meeting matters, and the first order is usually a trial on one product line.

How to enter, step by step

1. Prepare a Hungarian file. Translate technical sheets, instructions, declarations and price lists into Hungarian so they can go straight into a distributor's bid in EKR.
2. Assemble conformity evidence. Have CE marking, declarations of conformity and test reports ready, and check whether your product needs any national registration.
3. Find who already wins your category. Start with the award notices above the EU thresholds on TED for your CPV codes; Cresques reads these and lists the winning companies. For national notices, search the Közbeszerzési Értesítő on the Public Procurement Authority's website and set up its notice-watch service for your category.
4. Check centralised procurement. The centralised procurement portal (kozbeszerzes.gov.hu) of KEF, the Közbeszerzési és Ellátási Főigazgatóság (Directorate-General for Public Procurement and Supply), publishes information on the framework agreements concluded through centralised procedures — recent examples include disposable syringes and needles, mammography equipment and operating lamps. If your category is bought that way, the framework holders are the distributors to approach.
5. Make a cautious first contact. The safest first step is a letter by post to the managing director, a trade fair or an introduction. If you e-mail, prefer the generic address the company publishes (NMHH treats a company's contact person like the company), identify your company fully, offer a free way to object and stop at once if asked; get consent before writing to a sole trader, and do not send an e-mail asking for consent, which is itself advertising.
6. Prepare the first meeting. Bring a margin that holds after a competitive tender, a position on price changes in a multi-year framework, payment terms that reflect public-sector payment practice, a proposed territory and an open view on exclusivity and direct accounts.
7. Plan for service. Show how delivery and after-sales service will work in the country, with spare parts available for the life of the contract.
8. Start with a trial and follow up in person. Expect the first order to be a trial on one product line; meet in person, and widen the range once it has won.

Where the evidence comes from

Above the EU thresholds — EUR 140,000 for supplies and services bought by central government bodies and EUR 216,000 for other public authorities from 1 January 2026 — Hungarian buyers must publish contract award notices, and those notices appear on TED, the online supplement to the Official Journal of the EU. Each notice names the winning company and carries CPV codes, so the distributors that repeatedly win, for example, medical consumables or school equipment contracts across Hungarian counties can be identified from the public record. National notices appear in the Közbeszerzési Értesítő.

Cresques reads the award notices for the CPV categories you choose and shows who already sells that category in Hungary. It does not help you bid for the contracts; the notices are evidence of who the buyers already trust, and the cautious first contact above is how you reach them.