Samsung to build cellphone plant in northern Vietnam

Samsung Electronics Co plans to build a US$670 million plant to make mobile phone handsets in northern Vietnam, a Vietnamese official said yesterday.

The world's second largest handset maker has been pushing for the Vietnam plant for nearly a year and submitted the proposal to authorities in Bac Ninh Province earlier last month, said Nguyen Quang Thanh of the provincial planning and investment department.

"They still lack some papers," Thanh said. "Once they fill in all necessary papers, we will grant the investment license right away."

RAMPING UP

The plant will produce 30 million mobile phone handsets a year in the first stage and will gradually expand to produce 100 million units, he said. Bac Ninh is 30km northeast of Hanoi.

Samsung executives in Hanoi were not available for comment yesterday. But officials from the South Korean company had earlier said that they were considering Vietnam for its cheap labor.

In addition to Samsung's domestic handset plant at Gumi, some 260km southeast of Seoul, Samsung also has handset facilities in China, India and Brazil.

DRAWING INVESTORS

Vietnam is the 6th most attractive place for foreign investors behind China, India, Russia, the US and Brazil, said Phan Huu Thang, director of the Foreign Investment Department, quoting the 2007 World Investment Report from the UN Conference on Trade and Development.

Pledges for foreign investment in Vietnam surged nearly 70 percent last year to a record US$20.3 billion.