At ASEAN Summit, Marcos to meet with businesses who want to expand ops in PH

President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. will meet with businesses looking to expand operations in the Philippines at the sidelines of the 43rd ASEAN Summit, including a firm that will provide the Philippines with avian influenza vaccine.

"The President will also be attending events specifically to pitch trade and investment in Indonesia – one of them will be a meeting with the ASEAN Business Advisory Council and another one with certain businesses who intend to expand their presence in the Philippines," Foreign Affairs Assistant Secretary for ASEAN Affairs Daniel Espiritu said at a Palace briefing Thursday.

"And in fact, among the companies that who will be there would be the WIR Asia who intends to expand one of its subsidiaries already existing in the Philippines to the tune of one billion pesos or 20 million dollars in fresh infusion to expand innovations in metaverse and artificial intelligence applications," he added.

Espiritu also mentioned the Darya-Varia Laboratoria and Vaksindo Satwa Nusantara, which, according to him, will soon provide the Philippines with avian influenza vaccines.

Espiritu said this company is from Indonesia and that it is already in the process of developing the vaccines.

Espiritu added that Marcos would also meet with officials of the Pasifik Satelit Nusantara, which already signed a letter of intent in September 2022 with the Philippines.

The firm will report to the President the progress of their project in Philippines and the launching of a satellite in December 2023, according to Espiritu.

"And then, they also plan to allocate 13.5 gigabytes per second of bandwidth for the Philippines," Espiritu said.

Meanwhile, when asked if the President would pitch the Maharlika Investment Fund during the ASEAN Summit, Espiritu said, "There are business events being planned but wala namang sinabing exactly na Maharlika na pag-uusapan doon ‘no."

[There are business event being planned by there is no certainty if the Maharlika Investment Fund will be taken up.]

— RSJ, GMA Integrated News