Amazing. The $3.5 billion Samsung plant deal in Austin was the biggest investment in the US in 2006. Texas could be in the running for up to 3 more plants, potentially raking in another $10.5 billion and up to 3,000 more jobs.
From the Austin American-Statesman
http://www.statesman.com/business/co.../7samsung.html
SAMSUNG
Austin leaders to visit South Korea
Officials will thank Samsung for chip plant and seek future investment.
By Kirk Ladendorf
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Mayor Will Wynn will lead a delegation to South Korea next week to thank Samsung Corp. for building its second chip factory in Austin and cultivate a relationship that city leaders hope might lead to more investment.
"The Samsung project was the single largest investment project in this country in 2006," said Dave Porter, senior vice president of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce. "It just makes sense for us to go over and do the proper thing, which is to thank them. . . . and set the stage for the next opportunity."
The next opportunity might be yet another chip plant. Samsung prefers to cluster its chip plants close together, and some Samsung officials have speculated that the company might build three to five chip factories in Texas.
The plant under construction in Northeast Austin will cost at least $3.5 billion, create 900 jobs and help secure Austin's future as a chip center for at least the next decade.
Some analysts expect it to be the biggest semiconductor plant ever built in this country.
Samsung owns about 300 acres in Austin. Its first plant, which opened in 1997, has more than 1,000 workers.
Austin competed aggressively for the plant, including sending a delegation of city and business leaders to Seoul in March 2005 and assembling a $231 million package of state and local incentives.
Making the trip with Wynn next week will be City Council Member Jennifer Kim; Tim Crowley, chairman of the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce; and Gary Farmer, chairman of the chamber's economic development arm, Opportunity Austin.
The group will host a dinner for senior Samsung executives at the posh Shilla Hotel in Seoul and present an Austin-made sculpture called "Spirit of Texas."
Bill Cryer, Samsung's Austin spokesman, also will be at the event.
Opportunity Austin is paying for the trip.
The delegation will leave Sunday and return Wednesday, spending two days in Seoul.
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