NEW YORK -- Gold Star Co., one of South Korea's largest electronics equipment producers, will build a $5 million color television plant in Huntsville, Ala.
It is the first South Korean factory to be built in the United States, Sun-Ray Choe, executive vice president of Gold Star, told reporters in New York Friday.
Gold Star, a member of South Korea's conglomerate, Lucky Group, with annual sales of more than $5 billion, plans to produce about 50,000 units in the first year of the operation and ultimately raise the yearly capacity to 400,000 units.
The company will initially employ 250 people, a figure which will be increased to around 1,000 as it steps up TV production and expands the factory for manufacturing refrigerators, microwave ovens, audio equipment and other items.
Construction of the facility on a 50-acre site will begin next June with startup scheduled for July, 1982.
Choe said his company is building the plant because U.S. import quotas, which will be 960,000 units for the two-year period ending July, 1982, are not large enough to accommodate its color TV sales in this country.
He said Gold Star will initially import chassis and other TV components for assembly at the plant.
Choe disclosed Gold Star is having difficulty in obtaining licenses to produce video tape recorders from Japanese electronics appliance makers.
But he said it is eyeing the production of videodisk players and expects to start marketing them in South Korea next year.
