Franco-Italian semiconductor maker SGS-Thomson Microelectronics NV, which expects its profit in 1993 to explode to $200m from $3m in 1992, reports that its factories in Southeast Asia have become successful laboratories for productivity. An article in La Tribune-Defosses says the company’s test and assembly factory in Muar, Malaysia, for example, saw its productivity grow 40% last year, turning out 5.5m chips per day compared to 3.7m a year earlier. SGS-Thomson has been enticed to Asia for the quality of manufacturing and for the booming market for electronic components, which is growing at 30% per year (not including Japan), the paper says. Singapore, it says, buys as many chips today as France, it says. To take full advantage of the market, SGS-Thomson is planning to increase output of its Muar factory by one third in November.
