Despite widespread opposition from Costa Rica's conventional taxi drivers and the Public Works and Transport Ministry (MOPT), Uber has decided to pursue its business in the country nonetheless, announcing that it would open its headquarters, dubbed a "Center of Excellence," in the island nation within the year, according to The Costa Rican Times.

The MOPT, of course, has not given up the fight. Uber, after all, launched itself in the Latin American nation last August without being sanctioned by the ministry. By doing so, Uber's services in the country practically became illegal.

In response to the illegal launch of the popular transport service, the MOPT immediately initiated a crackdown on Uber drivers and their vehicles. Local taxi drivers, who represented the sector that Uber threatened the most, took matters into their own hands, as well, with one incident involving taxi drivers smashing the windows of an Uber driver's vehicle.

With Uber's announcement, however, the MOPT is once more on the move.

"Any activity connected to the operation of Uber, even if it is technically legal, will be exhaustively investigated to make sure that it does not support the operation of a business that is illegal in the eyes of the country's current laws," the MOPT said in a statement, according to TeleSUR.

Taxi drivers have also stated that they will be initiated a protest against Uber's headquarters' launch, with the drivers' union announcing that its members would be carrying out massive roadblocks on February 7, in order to pressure the government to regulate the operations of the popular transportation app.

Undaunted, however, Uber has stated that it would be investing $3.5 million in the creation of its Center of Excellence. Once launched, the company would be hiring hundreds of locals for a number of job openings, including bilingual customer service representatives, marketing managers, community operations managers, as well as other pertinent posts, reported Costa Rica News.

By the end of the year, Uber expects its staff in Costa Rica to number about 300.

The Center of Excellence is set to become Uber's Latin American hub for customer service relations, catering to the service's 300,000 subscribers in Costa Rica, and the millions more in the region.

Costa Rica's foreign direct investment agency has stated its optimism about Uber's investment in the Latin American country, stating that the island nation has a "tradition of receiving innovative companies."

With the impending protests from both the taxi drivers' union and MOPT, however, Uber might just need to push a bit harder to finally breach the Latin American state.