Lachica named acting SEIPI president

MANILA, Philippines - The Semiconductors and Electronics Industries in the Philippines Inc. (SEIPI) has named Dan Lachica as its acting president.

“On behalf of the SEIPI Board of Directors, I have the privilege of announcing the appointment of Dan Lachica as the SEIPI interim president,” SEIPI chairman Bing Viera announced.

Lachica has been a member of the SEIPI Board of Directors for over 10 years.

In the past, he held the position of treasurer and chairman.

Lachica has spent 16 years in various leadership roles in Silicon Valley in semiconductor front-end wafer fabrication.

Lachica is the president of silicon wafer slicing firm First Philec Solar Corp. (FPSC).

FPSC is a joint venture agreement between First Philippine Electric Corp. (First Philec) of the Lopez Group of Companies which controls 80 percent and SunPower Philippines Manufacturing Limited (SPML) of SunPower (San Jose, USA), which holds 20 percent.

Lachica replaces Ernesto Santiago who passed away after suffering a heart attack late last year.

The SEIPI is the representative body of players and industries supporting the development of Philippine electronics.

Earlier, the group said it expects the electronics industry to grow by five to six percent this year from an expected flat growth in 2012.

The growth for this year is expected to be supported by the start of operations of new plants involved in the production of electronic products and parts in the country.

For 2012, the SEIPI projects flat or zero growth due to depressed export market, weak consumer electronics demand, high power cost and the strong local currency.

Exports of electronic products reached $23.72 billion in 2011, down 23.67 percent from 2010.

Latest data from the National Statistics Office showed electronics exports for the January to November period reached $21.05 billion, down by 5.19 percent from the same period last year.