Nokia Set to Open Vietnam Manufacturing Center

Nokia is awaiting the final permits before it begins the construction of its first manufacturing plant in Vietnam, which is scheduled to open 23 April, according to Vietnamese news site BaoMoi.


The Finnish firm already has a memorandum of understanding over the site but it is waiting on the required investment license from the government before work can commence.


The facility is said to be worth up to $300 million, and will be located at the Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park (VSIP) in Bac Ninh, a province in the north of the country.


Nokia is planning to hold an event to officially unveil the new site on April 23, and it is looking to complete construction and have the factory operational over the coming months.


The firm is optimistic that, with that timeline, the predominantly low-end devices built in Vietnam will begin being sold to customers worldwide before the end of the year.


The opening of the production base will bring benefits to its host country. Nokia is expecting to increase the site’s existing workforce of 275 to 10,000 by the end of 2014, by which time the factory is expected to be churning out 45 million handsets per quarter.


The VSIP is already the site of an operational production plant from smartphone rival Samsung, and government officials are optimistic that, with the Finnish telecom giant’s investment, it can establish the VSIP as a mobile phone production hub for the region.


Nokia’s move to manufacture phones in Vietnam comes after the company has restructured a number of its internal processes, citing cost cutting. The most significant of these changes sees its Asia Pacific headquarters move to China from Singapore.


The company’s production facilities will also relocate to China, moving away from current base in Romania, and the upcoming factory in Vietnam will help carry the manufacturing load.


 

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