Ayala to put up 1st Phl-Sino industrial park

MANILA, Philippines — The Ayala Group, the country’s oldest conglomerate, is pioneering the first ever industrial park for Chinese manufacturers that want to set up shop in the country, its chairman Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala said last week.

The planned Philippines-Sino industrial park is envisioned to be a sprawling 200-hectare estate for Chinese manufacturing giants, to be developed within the next few years in Central Luzon, possibly in Pampanga.

“We are building the first Philippines-Sino industrial park...We would like to be the first one up in the Philippines to do that,” Zobel said in a press briefing after the annual stockholders meeting of Ayala Corp. on Friday.

The flagship project, which would cater to the fast growing Chinese businesses in the country, would be spearheaded by Ayala Land Inc. (ALI), the conglomerate’s property unit.

ALI president and CEO Bernard Vincent Dy said the company  has already partnered with a giant tile manufacturer in China which already set up operations in ALI’s Alviera Industrial Park in Porac, Pampanga.

The tile manufacturer is leasing warehouse space and is now preparing to boost production of tiles which would be sold in the local market and exported to foreign markets as well.

Aside from this, Dy said ALI is now in advanced stages of negotiations to acquire 100 to 200 hectares of land to build the Philippines-Sino industrial estate in Central Luzon.

“We’re now starting to look for a much larger parcel to be able to attract more Chinese locators,” Dy said.

The tile manufacturer could expand in this new industrial estate alongside other new Chinese locators as well.

“We’re now working with one of the largest tile manufacturers in the world to locate some of their plants in the Philippines,” Dy said.

Zobel said Ayala’s engagement with China has been huge and significant and probably one of the largest for a Philippine company.

It is done through the company’s different subsidiaries, he said.

For AC Motors for instance, he noted that Ayala has started to work together to leverage Chinese automobile manufacturers such Volkswagen’s China partnership as well as Maxus.

In telco, Ayala’s Globe also continues to deepen its business relationship with partner Huawei.

“And together, we are exploring piloting 5G technology in the Philippines,” Zobel said.

In all, he said the Ayala Group recognizes the increasing influence of China on the Philippine economy and in response, the company, has increased its investments strategically.

The conglomerate expects China’s influence over the Philippine economy to continue to grow on the back of the Duterte administration’s pivot to China.

Zobel, who hails from a Spanish-Filipino clan, said some people think that when a company’s owners are not ethnically Chinese, they don’t want to link up with China.

“It’s a phenomenon I encounter a lot but it’s not true...Ayala’s engagement with China is probably among the largest,” Zobel said.