Production Needs Filled in Malaysia
In late July, global pharmaceutical technologies manufacturer Colorcon marked the grand opening of the company’s new coating manufacturing plant in the Malaysian state of Johor. “Our goal is to anticipate market growth, adding capacity to ensure we are always a step ahead of demand,” said Colorcon CEO Simon Tasker. “This is just one of many development projects currently in our pipeline to support our credo of ‘we’re everywhere our customers need us to be.’ ” The 200,000-sq.-ft. facility represents the company’s seventh film coating manufacturing plant worldwide and will become the main production hub serving the Asia Pacific region. This investment will aid in reducing delivery time while strengthening the company’s global supply chain.
Project Stargate, which runs on 100% renewable energy, is designed to boost Norway’s AI ecosystem.
Photo courtesy of Nscale
Launching Project Stargate
OpenAI has reported that its 230-megawatt data center project located in northern Norway is officially complete. The Narvik data center is the company’s first European facility, capable of housing an initial capacity of 100,000 NVIDIA GPUs, although plans to scale the facility could mean an additional 290 MW at the site in years to come. This facility comes as global usage of AI applications such as ChatGPT continue to rise, especially for millions daily users across Europe. Project Stargate is jointly owned by AI infrastructure developer Nscale and Norway-based industrial company Aker, both of which worked on the project’s construction. “Large-scale compute capacity in Europe will help ensure that this transformation benefits people and communities — including developers, researchers, scientists and startups across Norway and Europe,” OpenAI stated in its original project announcement. The town of Narvik was selected due to the region’s access to hydropower, cool climate, low-cost renewable energy and quality industrial infrastructure.
The smart factory will include digitalization technologies and artificial intelligence to enhance manufacturing processes.
Rendering courtesy of Nissui Group
Constructing a One-Stop-Shop
Japan-based Nissui Corporation has plans to grow its domestic food business operations in the Fukuoka Prefecture city of Kitakyushu. In the Tobata Ward on the former site of a frozen food facility that was lost to a fire in 2021, the company broke ground in August to establish a new head office in addition to a new production facility. Operations currently housed in the company’s Nissui Tobata Factory and Kitakyushu Nissui Factory will transition to the new facility once complete in 2026. The new manufacturing plant will aid in increasing productivity by 150%, while consolidating production to make room for new product development.
Safran Landing Systems supplies about 55% of commercial airlines with its products.
Photo courtesy of Safran Group
Safran Gears Up in France
Outside of Lyon, France, the Plaine de l’Ain Industrial Park — the largest in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region — has been selected for Safran’s new 323,000-sq.-ft. aircraft carbon brake manufacturing facility. Access to low-carbon electricity was essential to the company’s site selection process, as energy accounts for 30% of a carbon brake’s production cost. “The choice of this site in France is the result of a collaborative effort by the French government, the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes regional authority, French electric utility EDF, national grid operator RTE and all the stakeholders, whose support I gratefully acknowledge,” said Safran CEO Olivier Andriès. The $514 million project is anticipated to come online by 2030, increasing capacity by 25% each year until 2037. Safran expects to create up to 200 new jobs once the facility reaches full capacity.
Quasar Medical’s Chonburi manufacturing plant will create more than 2,000 jobs by 2030.
Rendering courtesy of Quasar Medical
Bets Placed on Southeast Asia
Hong Kong-based medical devices manufacturer Quasar Medical is constructing a new manufacturing facility in Thailand and has now opened its new global headquarters in Singapore. By the start of 2026, the company will open its seventh global Center of Medical Device Excellence location in Chonburi, marking its second manufacturing site in Thailand. The facility will span 140,000 sq. ft. and will support the company in strengthening its global supply chain of micro-assembly devices. Meanwhile, relocating Quasar’s HQ to Singapore was a strategic move to center the company in Asia’s medtech ecosystem. “We are expanding advanced operations, growing a strong local team, creating career opportunities and positioning Quasar as an employer of choice within Singapore’s medtech community,” said Quasar Medical Site Leader Erik Trip. The company anticipates growing its current workforce of 180 to over 300 within the next three years.
