Danish firm opens $30M plant in Batangas industrial park

STO. TOMAS, BATANGAS—Danish firm Sonion on Wednesday opened a $30-million facility here that will design and manufacture miniature components and solutions for hearing instruments and advanced acoustics.

About $30 million, or P1.29 billion, was earmarked for this project. Of the amount, Sonion Philippines Inc. director general Niels Ole Jeppesen said, $22 million had been spent to set up operations at the First Philippine Industrial Park and employ 130 people.

During the inauguration of the facility Wednesday, Jeppesen said the capital outlay would be completed by the end of 2014. By that time, the company is expected to have hired 800 workers, including product and process design engineers, for its factory.

The facility can accommodate as many as 2,000 employees, Jeppesen added.

This early, Sonion Group president and CEO Jorn Morkeberg sounded off plans to further expand the company’s operations, using its remaining available area of about 17,000 square meters. Its current facility occupies an 11,500-sqm block within the industrial estate.

Morkeberg said the Philippines was the preferred site of the company’s parent firm in Denmark due to the “generally high educational level of the workforce” in the country.

He likewise cited the competitive incentives given to foreign investors, as well as the “warm welcome” and good cooperation that Sonion received from the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza).

In the meantime, European Union Ambassador Guy Ledoux said the inauguration of the new factory was a “good illustration of the strong and growing economic relationship between the EU and the Philippines.