Zoltán Kovács
MD, Head of Finance
Born in 1978 in Kecskemét, he is the father of a son and a daughter.
The ÁFEOSZ Secondary School of Economics and Commerce in Kecskemét provided a solid foundation for his further studies. He pursued higher education in Győr at the then Széchenyi István College, where he earned a degree in economics with specializations in accounting and finance.
He joined Fornetti Kft. as a fresh graduate in 2000. Starting in the accounting department, he played a significant role in establishing the foundations of financial and commercial controlling. During the challenges posed by the 2008 global economic crisis, he was instrumental in managing difficulties not only for Fornetti Kft. in Hungary but also for its Romanian and Bulgarian subsidiaries. Since 2010, he has served as the company’s authorized managing director and the financial director of the Fornetti Group.
A key milestone in his career was the sale of the Fornetti Group in 2015, where he actively contributed to supporting the sales process and integrating the professional standards and corporate culture of the new owner, Aryzta AG. The external and internal changes resulted in the continuous expansion of his responsibilities.
Currently, he is responsible for the management, development, and oversight of finance, accounting, controlling, strategic procurement, human resources, labor relations, information and communication technology, regulatory and internal compliance, and the internal control system, ensuring their efficiency and effectiveness.
In November 2024, he was entrusted with the interim leadership of the Fornetti Group, representing a new challenge and additional responsibility alongside his existing duties.
Szilárd Kelemen
Head of Sales
He was born in 1986. After completing high school with a focus on humanities, he continued his studies at the Faculty of Food Engineering, at the University of Szeged, majoring in Economics.
After obtaining his degree, he started working in the retail industry as an online advertising platform sales representative. He joined Fornetti in 2009. He worked as a sales representative for two years and then as a sales manager, gaining valuable experience in the development and expansion of the franchise market. From 2012 to 2014 he served as the regional manager for the Budapest area, and later became the Commercial Director for Fornetti Romania. Since December 2016, he has held the position of International Franchise and Concept Director. From 2023 he has been supporting the Fornetti team as Group Commercial Director.
In his free time, he dedicates himself to his family, common trips and music.
Martin Udvarev
Interim Head of Operations
Martin Udvarev was born in Budapest on 17 August 1973. He graduated from the Bulgarian-Hungarian Bilingual High School and continued his studies in finance at the Kodolányi János University. Between 2003 and 2005 he studied business management in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, and in 2020 he completed a course in Strategic Financial Management at the Metropolitan School of Business and Management in the United Kingdom.
He worked for four years at the Hungarian Embassy in Sofia as a Financial Officer and Deputy Consul before becoming Managing Director of Fornetti Bulgaria in October 2006. He successfully managed Fornetti Bulgaria for 17 years, where his outstanding achievements included the launch of the franchise system in the country, opening 200 franchise units in 200 days in 2006. He also managed the construction and installation project of a new 4,000 m² manufacturing plant in Ihtiman, which was completed within just 10 months in 2008.
Since 1 May 2023, he has been Managing Director of Fornetti Romania.
From November 2024, he has been Acting Group Chief Operating Officer of the company.
Ádám Chiovini
Head of Operations
Born on December 14, 1990, in Kecskemét, he began his studies at the Bányai Júlia High School in his hometown. He later earned an engineering degree from the University of Szeged. In 2017, he completed Aryzta's one-year Graduate Development Program at the Irish Management Institute, which further deepened his professional knowledge and leadership skills.
In 2019, he started studying economics in English as part of the Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) program offered jointly by Corvinus University of Budapest and the Maastricht School of Management in the Netherlands.
He began his professional career in 2010 at Fornetti Ltd. Initially working in the baking laboratory, he later joined the quality management department where he spent three years as a quality controller in both Hungary and Romania. In 2015, he transitioned to the technical and maintenance department as an environmental engineer, supporting the technical director for over three years.
From 2018, he served as Operations Business Partner, supporting Fornetti Group's COO and the team across Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. His responsibilities included planning and implementing organizational transformations, developing performance and efficiency improvement programs and managing group-level investments and projects.
In July 2021, he was appointed Head of Technical Services at Fornetti Group. In this role, he played a key part in supporting production, driving sustainability initiatives, and fostering technical innovation.
In January 2023, he joined the parent company, ARYZTA AG, as Global Head of Engineering leading and providing technical and maintenance support to the Group’s 28 factories, overseeing strategic projects, and leading the company's ESG-focused Energy Excellence Program implementation and management.
He enjoys spending his free time with his family, particularly his young son, as well as with friends. He is passionate about traveling and remains an active basketball player.
Jenő Fekete
Supply Chain Director
Born on 29th February, 1979, he is the father of a small daughter. He is an IT-expert with a university education. He graduated from the College of Mechanical Engineering and Automation in Kecskemét. Fornetti is his first workplace, to which he applied because he knew that it was a developing and renowned company – indeed, this was the only workplace he wanted to apply for. Tracking changes represent the biggest challenge for him here. He feels that working here leaves no time for boredom at all!
He spends his little spare time with his family and riding his bike.
Kitti Kelemen-Pataki
Creative Director
She graduated from the University of Szeged with a degree in Food Business Management Engineering and later obtained degrees in Engineering Teaching and Economics from the University of Economics. She started her career at Fornetti in 2009, joining the company during her college internship.
Throughout her career, she worked as a marketing assistant, then as the head of the sales and marketing office, and later as the head of the creative department. Since 2015, she has served as Fornetti's group creative director. Over the past decade, the creative team has transformed into an inspiring community built on close collaboration, where individual talents and the synergy of teamwork result in extraordinary projects. The team she leads is dedicated to building the Fornetti Lovebrand, developing the overall brand identity, graphic design, audiovisual content production, full store concepts, managing social media platforms, and supporting PR and CSR activities. For her, the team is not merely a group of colleagues but a creative force whose harmony is the true foundation of their shared success.
In her personal life, she is passionate about traveling, and her husband and twin sons bring joy to her everyday life.
EMESE MUCSI
HR Director
Born in Kecskemét in 1974. She worked for 18 years in adult education as a language teacher, English language coach, translator and interpreter before joining Fornetti in May 2015 as Aryzta Business Partner, supporting the management and the cooperation and work among the different departments.
Since September 2017, he has been Head of HR at Fornetti, the then newly established HR department. Her main task and objectives are to support the continued effective and sustainable operation of Fornetti Group by creating and managing coherent HR processes, which in turn creates a sustainable, continuously improving, diverse, rewarding and supportive working environment for the company's employees.
She spends most of her free time with her family. She enjoys reading, hiking and sports.
Attila Jeszenői
IT Director
Having graduated from the College for Traffic and Transport life gifted him with the beauties of IT technology.
Following a few years working as a beginner at work places he was at the right time on the right place and soon found himself in the bakery industry and soon found that his job to work out processes as part of a bigger system as an IT engineer became his hobby even to date. As a result of constant changes and development right from the beginning he is now head of the IT team and works in the field of development and operations alike.
Márton Benke
Finance Director, Fornetti Group Controller
Born in Szolnok on 20th October, 1987, Márton graduated in finance and accountancy, specialised in controlling in his home town.
He began his working career as a controller working first in the meat and then in automotive industry. Returning to the food industry he began with Fornetti as a controller in April 2014.
He found working with an excellent team in the due diligence process prior to the acquisition of the company an exciting challenge. He sees continuous professional development in integrating in the Aryzta Group financial system and processes.
As of November 2015 he has been Fornetti Group’s controller, and acts as Fornetti Kft’s CFO since August 2016 overseeing operations in the financial, accounting, invoicing and controlling departments.
Márton enjoys spending his free time with his partner, on excursions and watching films. He is passionate about folk music and folk dances which he has been actively practising as a member of a folk dance group since he was 7.
Sándor Lencsés
Hungarian Franchise and Concept Director
Sándor Lencsés was born in 1981. After graduating as a German teacher, he started to work at Fornetti Kft. in 2004 as sales representative. During these years he gained all-round knowledge about the market. Using his outstanding communicative and organisation skills, he continued his career as regional leader, where he did a lot for the most effective operation of sales locations.
From December 2016 he is the Junior Hungarian Franchise and Concept manager – his professional experience means a serious support for the sales team of Fornetti.
As he is the father of 3 children, he mostly spends his free time with his family. He follows the events of the English and Spanish football and Formula-1 with interest.
Gábor Papp
Franchise Technical Director
He was born on 2nd December, 1975. He is the father of two children. Having finished his agricultural and custom administrator studies, he obtained a degree-level education. His professional and human qualities were recognised at his former workplace, as a result of which he was invited to Fornetti in 2004. Continually changing new tasks and their up-to-date, precise solutions are the most challenging for him.
He spends his spare time primarily with his family; secondly, he enters competitions with his Malinois working dog, solving inspection and safeguarding tasks.
Ferenc Németh
Product Development Director
He completed his secondary school studies in the prominent food industry vocational school in Nagykőrös and specialised as baker and confectioner technician. He completed his higher education studies as a correspondence student in the Szeged Food Industry Engineering College while already working for Fornetti.
He joined Fornetti in 2003 and started in the product development team in 2005. Since 1st May 2018 he has been the Product Development Director.
Constant renewal every day is vital for him, to be able “to learn something new every day”.
He is married and has a son. He enjoys fishing, reading and spends his free time with his family.
Péter Csizi
Quality Assurance Director
I graduated from Szeged University as a food engineer and spent a few months in the meat industry as an intern, before I got a job in Fornetti as a quality controller.
I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to work in a professionally challenging environment that has provided me with a deep knowledge of the various areas and responsibilities of food safety systems and food quality assurance. Being a QA professional means constant learning and development that is the drive both for me and my team in our everyday work. Aryzta Group, the expanded customer and partner network, as well as the customer needs and the requirements set by the Fornetti name all add further dimension to that.
In my free time I like doing sports and my readings primarily include professional books and articles.
Norbert Kiss
Production Director
Born on 7 February 1984 in Nyírbátor. He is married and lives in Nagykőrös with his wife and daughter.
He graduated from the Vilmos Westsik Vocational School for Food Industry in Nyíregyháza, specialising in baking and confectionery.
He worked as a baker for two years early on in his career.
In 2005, he joined the Fornetti team where he tried his hand at various areas of production.
Since 2010, as a technology developer, he has been supporting the work of foreign subsidiaries by training and installing new technologies.
In June 2016, he became Deputy Production Manager and in August 2017 Production Manager.
Since 2020, he has been in the role of Senior Plant Manager to all Fornetti production sites.
It is a great and exciting challenge for him and his staff to coordinate the production of such a successful company, producing products of outstanding quality and food safety.
Continuous learning is important to him and he is currently studying at the Budapest University of Economics.
He spends all his free time with his family.
Csaba Bakos
Production Director
I was born on 19th February 1980. I finished secondary vocational school as joiner but never worked in this profession. In 2000 as my first workplace I joined the Fornetti team. I was drawn into the continuous development and was inspired by the challenges. I worked in nearly all positions in the production from dough maker to plant leader, and since May 2019 I have been the director of the Kiskunfélegyháza factory. It continues to be an inspiration for me that there is always something new to learn and there is place for introducing modifications and improvements.
In my free time I try to spend as much time as possible with my three children and my wife. My hobbies include NFL, Formula 1 and gastronomy.
Dániel Maróti
Procurement Director
I was born in 1978, Kecskemét. I joined Fornetti in summer 2019 after having worked over 15 years in the food industry as procurement professional and manager. I graduated as economist and have done studies in logistics. I thoroughly enjoy implementing in practice the knowledge I gathered during my education, as well as the continuous learning by doing my job. This is what inspires me, and I am doing my best to bring it to Fornetti’s long-term benefit.
I am characterised by being very active, seeking continuously for the better in the field of procurement, and to bring the best to the Company. Once the best is found, it takes hard work and efforts to maintain it for long term.
I am open and cooperative, but also conservative in some respects. I believe these are all necessary for managing cooperation successfully within Fornetti, which in turn will contribute to the Company being profitable.
I live in Kecskemét with my family. I do sports in my free time and read when time allows.