Japanese materials supplier Toray Industries has established a representative office for the resin business of its Thai subsidiary Thai Toray Synthetics Co., Ltd. (TTS) in Hanoi, the company has announced.
The move, it said, was in order to capture the “expanding engineering plastic demand” in the Vietnamese market.
The office began operations earlier this month.
According to Toray, GDP per capita of Vietnam exceeded $2,000 in 2014, and the country is a promising market where stable economic growth of 6 percent or more is expected in the future.
Additionally, said the company, the “China plus one movement” is also gathering pace. This strategy broadly refers to companies that have the bulk of their operations in China but are also active in at least one other Asian country, to reduce costs and dependence on China.
In that connection, more and more Japanese office automation and auto parts manufacturers and South Korean electronic appliance manufacturers are expected to shift their production from China.
Hanoi has been promoting the “China plus one” strategy, for multinationals to increase their footprint in Asia.
Vietnam is increasingly gaining importance, not just as a manufacturing base but also as a consumer nation, with further growth anticipated.