Acer restructures local operations

Acer Information Products (Philippines) Inc., which will be renamed Wistrom Infocomm (Philippines) Corp. is restructuring its local operations to widen its market to other computer companies worldwide.

Wistrom will have a capitalization of $36 million and will remain an affiliate of the Acer Group of Companies.

Acer’s mother unit in Taiwan, Acer Inc., has decided to restructure its Philippine operations as part of its effort to widen its market to other computer companies worldwide.

After the restructuring, Acer Inc. will separate its design, manufacturing and services (DMS) operation from the Acer Brand Operation and other related holdings and investment interest.

Acer Inc. will become a marketing and service company, while Wistrom will focus on original equipment manufacturing (OEM) and origional design manufacturing (ODM) business.

The separation would help to create a stronger position for Wistrom’s capability and communications technology field.

The main purpose of the separation is to avoid potential conflicts between OEM of other popular computer brands such as IBM and Hitachi with Acer products and business.

AIP/Wistrom currently has a workforce of about 2,300 employes. It was able to ship out 10 million motherboards and one million notebook computers last year.

AIP posted revenues of $780 million last year, contributing 2.1 percent of total Philippine exports and about 70 percent of the total $1.2 exports earnings of the Subic Freeport.

The desktop plant of AIP in Subic was inaugurated on June 15, 1995, while the mobile plant started its operation on September of 1998.