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.
The domestic unit of the Chinese-owned, Dutch-headquartered chipmaker Nexperia BV will soon be able to produce semiconductors locally within China, according to two company sources. Nexperia is at the center of a global tug-of-war over critical semiconductor technology, with a Dutch court in February ordering a probe into alleged mismanagement at the company. The geopolitical tussle has disrupted supply chains, with some carmakers reportedly forced to cut production due to chip shortages. Local production would allow Nexperia’s domestic arm, Nexperia Semiconductors (China) Ltd (安世半導體中國), to bypass restrictions in place since October on the supply of silicon wafers — etched with tiny components to
Singapore-based ride-hailing and delivery giant Grab Holdings Ltd has applied for regulatory approval to acquire the Taiwan operations of Germany-based Delivery Hero SE's Foodpanda in a deal valued at about US$600 million. Grab submitted the filing to the Fair Trade Commission on Friday last week, with the transaction subject to regulatory review and approval, the company said in a statement yesterday. Its independent governance structure would help foster a healthy and competitive market in Taiwan if the deal is approved, Grab said. Grab, which is listed on the NASDAQ, said in the filing that US-based Uber Technologies Inc holds about 13 percent of
Taiwan is open to joining a global liquefied natural gas (LNG) program if one is created, but on the condition that countries provide delivery even in a scenario where there is a conflict with China, an energy department official said yesterday. While Taiwan’s priority is to have enough LNG at home, the nation is open to exploring potential strategic reserves in other countries such as Japan or South Korea, Energy Administration Deputy Director-General Chen Chung-hsien (陳崇憲) said. While the LNG market does not have a global reserve for emergencies like that of oil, the concept has been raised a few times —
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday received government approval to deploy its advanced 3-nanometer (3nm) process at its second fab currently under construction in Japan, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said in a news release. The ministry green-lit the plan for the facility in Kumamoto, which is scheduled to start installing equipment and come online in 2028 with a monthly production capacity of 15,000 12-inch wafers, the ministry said. The Department of Investment Review in June 2024 authorized a US$5.26 billion investment for the facility, slated to manufacture 6- to 12nm chips, significantly less advanced than 3nm process. At a meeting with
RSS