I got to experience this firsthand during a recent trip to beautiful Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, where I covered the formal investment announcement of semicon giant Intel to build a test and assembly plant there worth initially at $ 300 million.

In his speech, Intel chair Craig Barrett stressed the new Vietnam facility is just an expansion and will not affect the operations of other plants in the Philippines, Malaysia, China, and Costa Rica. "We’re not closing any factories," he said.

What he said was true — Intel is not shutting down its test and assembly plant in Gen. Trias, Cavite. But the sad reality is this: Among the countries in Asia where it has a test and assembly plant, the Philippines is the only country in which Intel is neither expanding nor investing a significant portion of the billion it has allotted for the region.

Intel is pouring a whopping $ 270 million to increase the capacity of its Malaysian plants. The figure is just $ 30 million short of the amount that the company is initially investing in Vietnam.

Intel, however, is committed to add another $ 305 million to its Vietnam plant since the investment license that was awarded by the Vietnamese government calls for a total amount of $ 605 million.

Another $ 300 million has been allocated by Intel to expand its plants in Shanghai and Chengdu in China.

What could have been the reason why Philippines was left out in the cold? I got the answer loud and clear when I, together with three other media members from Southeast Asia, sat for a short group interview with Barrett himself.

After I’ve introduced myself as the lone media representative from the Philippines, the executive gave an impish smile and blurted, "You’ve been in the headlines these days." (The date was February 28, just three days after the GMA issued Proclamation 1017.)

That comment set the tone for the duration of the interview, with Barrett always looking in my direction every time "political stability" was mentioned. As he was seated beside me, he sometimes tapped my shoulder, each time drawing laughter from people inside the room.

When asked why Intel decided to invest in Vietnam, a developing country which normalized its relation with the US fairly recently, Barrett seriously noted that his company was greatly impressed with the favorable investment climate and its aggressive stance in luring foreign investors.

Barrett underlined the strategic importance of the Vietnam plant when he said the facility will be making chipsets that will be shipped to different parts of the globe.

Here now lies the danger for the Philippine plant, which manufactures microprocessors, including Pentium 4 that is scheduled to be phased out soon, because Intel is slowly moving from a microprocessor-focused strategy to a platform-based approach that involves an ecosystem of solutions and hardware driven by chipsets. This is evidenced by its aggressive promotion of the Centrino and Viiv platform technologies.

Closing down the Cavite plant maybe far-fetched, but for Intel, it seems its importance as a manufacturing hub has somewhat been diminished — thanks to the politicos.

The state of affairs was summed best by Barrett when he said that the Philippines, it seems, is now "self-destructing" the gains it has acquired in the past. — Melvin G. Calimag

Guess why and guess who

Randall Lozano has resigned as president of Techwave Corp., one of the firms controlled by IT veteran Jun Hallare. Nine employees also resigned from the company. What’s the reason behind the resignation? Let’s keep it under wraps for the meantime.

Meanwhile, a chairman of a big bank in Makati is allegedly in a hot water and is being audited for his extravagance and frequent trips abroad. The funds of the chairman, apparently, are inappropriate and do not go through the proper procedure. Concerned employees have expressed their disgust over the frequent use of the bank’s helicoper to visit the branches. Let’s wait for the findings of the audit. — Edu H. Lopez