TOP GLOBAL PROJECTS

sia’s booming industrial centers are exerting an enormous pull on global capital investment, and it should come as no surprise that China is the recipient of much of that investment.

Goods movement continues to push East Asian project investment, while India’s services sector continues to create large numbers of jobs in South Asia.

The charts on this page reflect only the top 20 projects outside the United States according to capital investment, jobs created and square footage. But Site Selection analyzed far more than 20 projects per criteria to see the larger trends at work in 2005. In a universe of 115 top projects, Asia, including China, claimed 39 percent of the largest projects by investment; China on its own captured 14 percent. Runners up in the investment category were Western Europe at 22 percent and Eastern Europe, including Russia, at 19 percent.

   China’s influence on the global project scene is clearly evident in the chart showing top projects by square footage — more than half of the top 20 are in China. On a broader scale, of about 100 projects analyzed by their footprint, China alone claimed 26 percent with the rest of Asia garnering an additional 22 percent. With so many industries shifting manufacturing operations to China and other Asian markets, it’s hard to point to any one industry as being particularly active in this arena. But there is a preponderance of projects in the logistics and distribution area as manufacturers and others invest in infrastructure to store temporarily and then ship globally products made in Asia. The top 20 includes such projects in China, Japan and Spain.

   China’s automotive industry played a significant role, too, with new, super-sized facilities in Dalian, Nanjing and Tianjin. Western and Eastern Europe again closely trailed Asia’s performance in this category at 21 percent and 14 percent respectively. Canada and Latin America each captured 7 percent of 100 biggest projects by footprint.

   In the important new-jobs category, Asia was competitive, particularly with India’s contribution. The region claimed 20 percent of a broader universe of 164 major projects added to Site Selection‘s New Plant database in 2005. But Eastern Europe, including Russia, took 32 percent of the 164, and Western Europe matched Asia’s 20 percent. Poland, the Slovak Republic, Croatia and Romania all snared projects with 1,000 or more new jobs, but these countries, as well as Hungary and others, made a strong showing outside the top 20, too.