Thailand: Ducommun’s Southeast Asia Location
Founded in 1849, Ducommun Incorporated provides engineering and manufacturing services for the aerospace and defense industry. A key part of the Ducommun family of businesses is Ducommun LaBarge Technologies, a leading technology company with design, development, manufacturing, and test capabilities in the area of complex mechanical assemblies. Ducommun continues to grow profitably at $1 billion, while focusing on the demands from the global telecommunication marketplace.
Ducommun LaBarge Technologies continues production of highly complex electronic products through development of its site in Thailand. The company’s Thailand facility, established in 2006, houses manufacturing for the company’s innovative product lines of commercial microwave switches, millimeter wave oscillators, sensor products and complex wire and cable harness assembly. It was built to support the demands of these specific products in the U.S. and other international markets
BOI Incentives and Workforce Encourage Capital
Ducommun’s decision to choose Thailand as its Southeast Asia location were due to several key factors, which included Thailand’s skilled workforce, its available resources and investment environment
Andy Wu, VP of Offshore Operations & Continuous Improvement at Ducommun, stated, “Thailand provides an abundant, high quality, hard working and stable workforce."
Investors can be certain that employees in Thailand will be some of the most educated in Asia, as Thailand boasts an uncommonly high literacy rate of 96%. The country graduates over 300,000 individuals with bachelor, masters and doctorate degrees.
The government supports these graduates through its Human Resources Development Plan, which is designed to warrant an abundant supply of qualified personnel for high-tech jobs in all of Thailand’s core industries through a nine-year compulsory education law and multiple scholarship opportunities. This is to ensure that the country’s workforce will be able to meet the demands and skills required of the continually expanding sectors.
The Thailand Board of Investments (BOI) also contributes to the assurance of favorable incentives and conditions of Ducommun as a business. Examples of these incentives include tax exemption or reduction of import duties on machinery, land ownership to foreign investors and additional deduction of infrastructure costs.
“The BOI provided Ducommun with very pro-business incentives and services to encourage overseas and global businesses to invest in Thailand,” stated Mr. Wu.
A Manufacturing Machine
Ducommun’s decision to invest in Thailand is optimal as it is the 18th largest manufacturing output in the world and contributes substantially to the national income. This division is further responsible for producing a wide variety of goods such as plastics, electronics and integrated circuits. Currently its top export markets are the United States, Japan, and Singapore.
Mr. Wu explained, “Thailand provided a very friendly import/export environment so that Ducommun can easily move merchandise and capital. The BOI provided a business friendly interface for us to import raw materials, machinery and components from all over the world…the location of Thailand and also the sophisticated logistics network allows us to move the finished product to our customer rapidly.”
Dependable Assistance
Ducommun was not affected directly by the flood that hit Thailand last year. “Some of our suppliers were affected, but not Ducommun directly,” Mr. Wu explained. “The Thai government was able to provide some level of relief financially to both companies and employees.”
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