2 Japanese firms to open factories in Lopez-led FPIP

MANILA, Philippines - Two leading Japanese medical product manufacturers have selected Lopez-led First Philippine Industrial Park (FPIP) in Santo Tomas, Batangas, as the site for their respective Philippine expansion projects.

Tokai Medical Products (TMP) and JMS Company Ltd. (JMS), through their respective Philippine subsidiaries, have signed contracts with FPIP for the lease of areas within FPIP’s 442-hectare economic zone in Batangas.

Tokai Medical Products Philippines will turn its new plant in FPIP as platform for manufacturing medical catheters for export to Japan and the US. TMP’s plant within FPIP will be TMP’s first outside Japan. The medical catheters, such as aortic catheters and intra-aortic occlusion catheters, are products that assist heart disease patients.

JMS Healthcare Phl Inc., on the other hand, will manufacture and assemble medical devices and disposables, such as infusion sets, from FPIP for export to Japan, Europe and Latin America. The JMS plant within FPIP will be its first in the Philippines. JMS also operates facilities in China, Singapore, Indonesia)

Both companies recently conducted their respective ground-breaking ceremonies within FPIP with Lilia de Lima, director general of the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (PEZA), as guest of honor.

TMP’s local unit will start constructing its factory in January 2015 and move to commercial operations in October 2015. JMS, which has started building its factory within FPIP, expects to go on commercial operations in the first quarter of 2016.

TMP is a leading medical engineering company that continues to research and develop new medical products. Based in Nagoya, Japan, TMC is an internationally respected company in the field, especially for cardiac-related diseases.

Headquartered in Hiroshima, Japan, JMS develops devices for a wide range of healthcare sectors including, home health care systems, hospital equipment system and medical information systems. Its revenues amounted to ¥53.86 billion in March 2014, up from ¥49.06 billion a year earlier.

JMS and TMP join a growing list of FPIP locators that are recognized as leaders in their industries such as B/E Aerospace, Brother, Canon, Honda, Ibiden, Murata, Nestle, Philip Morris, Shimano, and Sunpower.

FPIP is a 70-30 joint venture between First Philippine Holdings Corp. (FPH), a holding company of the Lopez Group; and Sumitomo Corp., one of Japan’s biggest conglomerates. Early this year, FPIP received government approval for its 92-hectare expansion plan, called FPIP Special Economic Zone II.