Hungary has resumed Rubik’s Cube manufacturing after more than four decades, with Jász-Plasztik’s new line planned for about 1 million cubes a year and linked by the city to 27 new jobs.
The automated line opened Nov. 10 at Jász-Plasztik Kft.’s plant in Jászberény, the municipality said. Company owner and project director Kasza János said the annual production plan is about 1 million cubes. Jász-Plasztik said it launched the line with Spin Master to make a next-generation 3×3 cube.
The municipality tied the investment to 27 hires and said Jász-Plasztik employs more than 3,000 people nationwide. It described the company as an official supplier to Spin Master. Spin Master says it owns more than 400 trademarks protecting the Rubik’s Cube and its brand.
The city says Hungarian production stopped in the early 1980s, ending a manufacturing run that began in the country where inventor Ernő Rubik created the puzzle. Rubik invented it in 1974, according to the municipality. It first went on sale in Hungary as the Magic Cube in 1977, the Associated Press reported.
Hungary’s Central Statistical Office recorded no Rubik’s Cube production in 2022, while manufacturers produced 237,000 other logic toys that year. Those figures provide a pre-restart reference point: cube production was absent even as other logic toys were being made.
The Associated Press reported that production moved abroad after Rubik had difficulty obtaining materials in socialist Hungary. At the Jászberény opening, Rubik said, “The cube was born here,” the AP reported. The municipality said the return would bring production closer to key markets and attributed that rationale to Spin Master Senior Vice President Steven Radewych.
