Economic Developers in Southeastern North Carolina have seen increased interest in foreign investment in the region, along with the state, including attention from potential prospective companies in Asia.

During the final day of the N.C. Economic Development Association's annual conference in Wrightsville Beach, a group of panelists representing North Carolina in Japan, Korea and China held a discussion on the view of investing in the state from their part of the world.

The talk focused on Asian foreign direct investment (FDI) in the state, and overall there has been some “extremely large projects,” said Colin Kiser, business recruitment manager for the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina (EDPNC), who moderated the discussion.

"From my perspective as a project manager for EDPNC, I've got about 25 to 30 projects, depending on what you call active, right now; 75 percent of them, three-quarters, are FDI. Now that's higher than many of my colleges, but that just kind of shows you the amount of activity that we are seeing at EDPNC."

Since January 2015, $5.1 billion has been invested in North Carolina in FDI projects, he said.

State economic developers are using international offices to help source market opportunities that the state can either get into early or that “North Carolina would otherwise not have a chance to compete for,” he said.

The panelists agreed that one challenge of marketing the state is education.

“Not too many people know about North Carolina in Japan,” said Sumio Shibata, managing director of trade and investment for N.C. Japan Office. “Of course, they know the name of North Carolina, but they don’t know the exact location.”

Hyun-Sook Kim, managing director of Investment at the N.C. Korea Office, said when dealing with Korean business recruitment, she brings a map to meetings. 

"We're trying to show them and let them know where our North Carolina is located," she said, adding that what’s interesting is that Koreans do know about places in North Carolina, such as Duke University.

To help with developing international business, Danny Ding, managing director of investment for the N.C. China Office, said that local economic developers should be sure to put North Carolina after a city, town, or county name for any marketing efforts.

“Very few people in China know about North Carolina, where North Carolina is. There’s good and bad about it. The bad side … I don’t need to explain. But the good side is, when people don’t really know much about one place … they are actually open for information,” Ding added.

The panelists also noted that some of the biggest factors Asian companies are looking for when selecting a site for a business is location and workforce ability. Shibata noted the state's community college system and its ability to help create workforce opportunities.

Kiser said foreign investment in the state from Asian countries has increased. 

From a Chinese perspective, Ding said that has happened for two reasons: Chinese business owners have become financially capable to relocate or build facilities in the U.S., and with increasing relationships with exporting in the nation, firms are now wanting to be “closer to their clients.”

For Korea, last year its foreign direct investment was about $3.9 billion in the U.S., which was a 125 percent increase from four years earlier, Kim said. The reason for this rapid increase is that many companies want to expand their products in the market.

Japanese corporations are making money, and many of those companies will spend money outside the country to expand, Shibata said. For expansion, he is seeing companies go into Asia, Europe and the U.S., he said. That is partially due to the large consumer markets.

Bill Early, executive director of Brunswick Business & Industry Development (Brunswick BID), said after the conference Thursday that the information that was shared by the group will be helpful on the local level for recruitment. 

"I'm seeing more and more interest from foreign investment into North Carolina and the opportunities that we have to compete for that in Brunswick County," Early said.