From The Economist print edition:
China is choking on its success at attracting the world’s factories. That has handed its Asian neighbours a big opportunity
AS A vote of confidence in Vietnam, the decision by Intel early in 2006 to spend $350m building a new factory in the emerging South-East Asian economy was hard to beat. And yet, before the year was out, the American chipmaker went further and raised its investment to $1 billion. In eight months Intel had committed as much money to Vietnam as it had to China in the previous ten years.In the Johor region of Malaysia, another global firm, Flextronics, has fired up the production lines of a new M$400m ($110m) factory to make computer printers for another American firm, Hewlett-Packard. One of the largest contract electronics manufacturers, Flextronics already has vast facilities in China. But it chose Malaysia as the site for its latest investment. [Full Text]