Fresh on the heels of last week’s SelectUSA Investment Summit, learn
from the experts at Tractus how and why the ties between corporate Asia
and U.S. communities are strengthening every day.
As many in the U.S. celebrate Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month,
a U.S. business process outsourcing (BPO) firm is celebrating a new
investment in the Philippines: According to a report from Philippine
News Agency, a newswire service of the Philippines government, Atento is
establishing a new call center at the Iloilo Business Park in Mandurriao
District. The park already hosts 10 BPO operations in a country known
for its operations in the sector. Known for nearshoring CRM BPO services
for companies operating in the United States, New York–based Atento is
the largest provider of those services in Latin America, employing
approximately 135,000 people in 17 countries. Among Atento’s recent
projects is a new 150-job center in Paraguay and the re-opening of its
site in Caguas, Puerto Rico, where half of around 400 total positions
now have the option to work remotely. This project is Atento’s first
investment in the Philippines, where Frost & Sullivan projects the
contact center outsourcing market will grow by 6.2% annually through
2025.
The king of British-engineered techno-appliances has announced a major
R&D investment in Bristol alongside other major global facility
investments. As reported by the BBC, The Guardian and other news
outlets, Dyson is establishing a major R&D hub in central Bristol that
could host “hundreds of jobs in software engineering and AI. A The
company described the location as an “international hub in central
Bristol that could host “hundreds of jobs in software engineering and
AI. The company described the location as an “international hub for
software and digital skills.” The news comes as Dyson, now headquartered
at Tuas Singapore, is also pursuing a new battery plant in that country,
as well as a new technology center in Santo Tomas, Batangas,
Philippines. While company leaders have decried the lack of UK
government support for engineering, Dyson has continued to invest in its
home country, including a robotics center announced last year at the
Hullavington Airfield Campus in Wiltshire. “The new Dyson Technology
Centre in Bristol will be a vital hub contributing to Dyson’s connected
future,” said Jake Dyson, Dyson’s chief engineer and the son of company
founder Sir James Dyson. (Read Site Selection’s 2011 interview with Sir James.)
Go ahead and count them: There are 3,142 counties and equivalents in
the United States.
Map image courtesy of National Association of Counties
Site Selection’s July 2023 issue will mark the debut
of a new ranking: “America’s Best Counties” will salute the
top-performing counties cumulatively and per capita from
January 2022 through Q1 2023 in attracting major corporate
facility investments, according to the Conway Data Project
Database. Interested in deepening your knowledge of what the
nation’s 3,142 counties and equivalents offer? Check out the
National
Association of Counties’ County Explorer data and
mapping tool.
NASA’s Super Guppy aircraft lifts off from the Launch and Landing
Facility runway at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 25, 2023.
NASA said the aircraft was carrying the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module
(MPLM), used during the Space Shuttle Program to transfer cargo to and
from the International Space Station, to Ellington Field in Houston,
where it was then be transported by road to Axiom Space’s facility near
Ellington to be utilized to further commercialization of space. “Three
MPLMs were built by Thales Alenia Space Italia (TASI) for the Italian
Space Agency (ASI) and named after Italian masters (Leonardo, Raffaello,
and Donatello),” NASA explained. “Only two ever flew to the space
station, Leonardo and Raffaello, with Axiom intending to use the
Raffaello module as a future element that will attach to a segment being
built by the company for addition to the station.” Axiom Space broke
ground on a new headquarters complex at Ellington one year ago this
week.
