From Site Selection magazine, March 2003
WORLD REPORTS
|
Austria Touts High-Tech Contribution To Space Effort
Austria is promoting itself as a nexus of space exploration innovation in hopes of attracting foreign investment from high-tech firms. Led by Austrian subsidiaries of multinational firms such as Magna, Siemens and Saab Ericsson as well as a cross section of local companies, the Austrian industry is making significant contributions to a number of international projects. These include NASA’s Lisa mission and the Rosetta and Galileo projects sponsored by the European Space Agency (ESA), which has awarded Austria with contracts valued at several hundred million euros. Survey Says London, Paris and Frankfurt
Top List of Favorite European Locations Availability of qualified staff has become the single most important factor for companies deciding where to locate, according to European Cities Monitor, an annual survey by international real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield Healey & Baker.
followed by Paris and Frankfurt. Milan moves into the top 10 for the first time, with Prague and Dusseldorf each moving up four spots. Manchester fell five spots.
says David Hutchings, head of the firm’s European Research Group.
Hutchings adds that Central Europe is the key target of future expansion of European companies. Bridgestone Plans Third Thai Tire Factory
Bridgestone plans to spend US$136 billion to build a plant in Chonburi, Thailand, to produce radial tires for trucks and buses. The new plant will begin operation during the second half of 2004 and will have a daily production capacity of 2,500 tires. It will export to the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and other Southeast Asian countries. Ireland, Dublin Get Good Marks
Ireland and its largest city, Dublin, rank at the top or near the top of several recent lists and surveys.
and its continued investment in high-tech industries. Switzerland ranks second, also for the second year in a row.
over the past decade, along with Dubai and Las Vegas. The study examined 100 major metro areas worldwide and applied measures of economic growth, dynamic real estate activity and strong real estate performance. The three have common features which promote growth, the study says, including:
to be developed to attract jobs, infrastructure and population. China Becomes Top Furniture Exporter
China’s furniture industry, growing steadily for more than 20 years, recently surpassed Italy as the world’s largest furniture exporter with more than 16 percent of the global market, according to Furniture Today.
Welsh Group Plans
Optronics Incubator The Welsh Development Agency (WDA) plans to develop a national business incubation and research facility dedicated to the growth of the opto-electronics industry. OpTIC Technium (Optronics Technology & Incubation Centre) is an 82,000-sq.-ft. (7,600-sq.-m.), US$21 million facility that will include 24 incubator units, a state-of-the-art clean room and a technology center where researchers from industry and academia can coordinate efforts to develop new products and processes. The facility will be in the center of an existing cluster of opto-electronics companies in St. Asaph, North Wales, and will be operational by this fall. |
||||||
|
||||||
©2003 Conway Data, Inc. All rights reserved. SiteNet data is from many sources and not warranted to be accurate or current.
|