The R&D center will be LG's largest research base outside its headquarters in Seoul.

"China has become the largest manufacturing base for LG, and it will now become the largest R&D center for us," said John Koo, vice-chairman and chief executive officer of LG Electronics, at the opening ceremony of the research center.

Koo said the biggest opportunity China offers LG following the nation's entry to the World Trade Organization (WTO) was not its huge market or cheap labor, but its large pool of talented professionals who are capable of inventing and developing first-class products.

The R&D center currently employs more than 100 engineers and researchers, and the number will expand to 1,600 by 2005.

The research organ of LG will focus on three major aspects: digital household appliances, digital telecommunication products, and digital designs.

It is the fifth major investment of LG Electronic in China since the beginning of this year.

Earlier this month, LG Philips LCD (liquefied crystal display), a 50-50 joint venture formed between LG Electronics and Philips Electronics, announced plans to establish a LCD factory in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu Province, with a proposed investment of US$120 million.

In the first half of this year, LG invested US$230 million in its microwave oven project in Tianjin, US$6 million in a Guangdong Province-based optical memory factory and US$45 million into a CDMA (code division multiple access) mobile phone factory in the eastern province of Shandong.

(China Daily December 11, 2002)