Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam has seen positivesigns in attracting foreign direct investment (FDI) in the remaining months of2018 as a number of international investors are seeking to expand theirbusinesses in the southern key economic zone.

In the southern province of Dong Nai, AjinomotoVietnam Co., Ltd – a subsidiary of Ajinomoto from Japan which has been presentin Vietnam for 27 years – plans to build a new 8ha factory for foodmanufacturing at Long Thanh Industrial Park (IP), according to the subsidiary’sGeneral Director Keiji Kaneko.

The new facility will be the third of its kind basedin Vietnam, with one already existing at Long Thanh IP and another at Bien HoaI IP.

The food and seasoning manufacturer is alsolooking into the possibility of pouring extra investment in its production of bio-fertiliserin the country, Kaneko said.

Similarly, Bosch Group – the German-basedmultinational engineering and electronic company – received approval from localauthorities to invest an additional 71 million USD into its factory at LongThanh IP, Dong Nai this year. This was the fourth time the facility hadreceived extra funding since 2015.

In June last year, the company announced anadditional investment of 47 million USD for this facility, following the extracapital injections of 23 million USD in 2015 and 22 million USD in 2016.

The added funding has been spent to purchase machineryand equipment to raise the manufacturing capacity of its push belt forcontinuously variable transmission (CVT), which is in high demand fromautomakers in Asia, particularly Southeast Asia.

Bosch’s total FDI in Vietnam is estimated atabout 380 million USD at present.

Singapore’s OPV Pharmaceuticals also increasedits capital in a project at Bien Hoa II IP by 47.7 million USD, bringing thefirm’s total investment in the country to nearly 70 million USD.

Dong Nai has drawn approximately 1.3 billionUSD in FDI in the first nine months of 2018, 30 percent higher than its yearlytarget. It licensed 81 new projects worth 605 million USD and allowed 77 othersto add 694 million USD. The majority of the new projects have been in thesupporting industry.

In Binh Duong, another province in the southernkey economic zone, the combined FDI injection from January to September hit1.18 billion USD, fulfilling 85 percent of the yearly goal, according toDirector of the provincial Department of Planning and Investment Nguyen ThanhTruc.

The Horasis Asia Meeting 2018 will also convenein Binh Duong this November, bringing together about 700 Vietnamese and foreignbusiness leaders, said Truc. It will be a good opportunity for the province tolure more investors, he added.

So far, Binh Duong has hosted 3,430 FDI projects worth 31.29 billionUSD, clinching the first position among localities nationwide in FDIattraction.

Many multinational conglomerates have set theirsights on Vietnam amid changing global FDI flow trends, said Le Hoai Quoc, headof Saigon Hi-tech Park’s (SHTP) management board. Since it was founded 16 yearsago, the SHTP has attracted 5.4 billion USD in FDI, a large amount of whichcame from global high-tech giants like Intel, Samsung, and Nidec, he noted.

Even more major FDI projects are expected toland in the park in the coming time. Most notably among them is a research anddevelopment (R&D) centre of Nidec Corporation, a Japanese manufacturer ofelectric motors, which is part of the firm’s moves to expand operations inVietnam. The project’s proposal has been submitted to competent authority forreview.

Nidec now operates five projects at SHTP with atotal registered capital of around 500 million USD, which engage in precisionengineering, automation, optical reading heads, magnetic stripe cards,high-precision compact motors, and motor spare parts.

Quoc further unveiled that the negotiationprocess for a project that produces batteries for Tesla’s electric vehicles tobe set up at the SHTP is at the final stage. The project, which will be run bya US-based company, will have an investment of about 500 million USD, he added.

Ho Chi Minh City raked in 5.47 billion USD inFDI in the first three quarters of the year, up 50 percent year-on-year. The FDI flow mostly came from the Republic of Korea(28.1 percent), Singapore (25.7 percent), Norway (11 percent), and Japan (10percent). –VNA