Acer to Build Computer Plant in Mexico
Computer giant Acer will build a huge computer plant in the border town of Mexicali, Mexico, that will provide 1,200 jobs, the first in what is expected to be a succession of Taiwanese companies flocking to Baja California, state officials said Monday.
Jorge Gallego Salas, Baja’s secretary of economic development, said Acer Peripherals will start construction in January on the $80-million, 700,000-square foot complex that ultimately will churn out 3.4 million monitors per year. Acer will also use the facility to assemble its line of budget-priced personal computers, Gallego said.
Like the Japanese and South Korean companies that have preceded them with factories in Baja California, Taiwanese firms plan to use Mexico as a tariff-free gateway into the U.S. market under the North American Free Trade Agreement. That has created an employment boom all along the U.S.-Mexico border and sent Mexican exports skyrocketing.
Taipei-based Acer is one of the world’s fastest-growing electronics companies, vaulting to eighth place in personal computer sales last year with $5.8 billion in global revenue. The Mexicali plant will assemble 14- and 17-inch color monitors, and at first will send two-thirds of its output to the Mexican market, where Acer has a 38% share of PC sales.
Officials at Acer America, the company’s San Jose-based U.S. marketing unit, did not return telephone calls Monday for comment.
Globally, Acer last year produced 4 million PCs, 3.5 million monitors, 52 million memory chips and 1.7 million CD drives.
Several of Acer’s suppliers are expected to follow suit with factory deals in coming weeks, and Gallego said the number of Taiwanese companies in Mexicali at the end of 1997 could total 14. He said Baja Gov. Hector Teran Teran recruited Acer amid competition from other border cities.
Mexicali, the Baja state capital that up to a few years ago was dominated by government bureaucracy and agriculture, is attracting increasing numbers of foreign manufacturers discouraged by the high land prices and employee turnover in Tijuana, where the bulk of the state’s maquiladoras are located.
Acer bought about 45 acres in Mexicali, enough to accommodate not just itself but several of its suppliers nearby, Gallego said. Acer is also rumored to be near an agreement to build an electronic circuits plant in Ciudad Juarez, across the Texas border from El Paso, but no deal has been reached.
Japanese companies such as Sony and Sanyo, and South Korean companies such as Samsung and Daewoo, have relocated or expanded their operations in Tijuana and Mexicali, making Baja California the world’s largest television manufacturing center.
The region is claiming a growing share of computer monitor production as well. Daewoo will soon complete construction of a Mexicali television and computer monitor plant that will employ 1,600.
Gallego also said Asahi Glass of Japan, Corning of the United States and Samsung of South Korea formed a formal partnership during Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo’s visit to Asia last month to build a glass factory in Baja. The group is close to selecting a site, he said.
