NOTICES
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
[Docket 40-91]
Application for Subzone, IBM Information Processing Equipment Plant,
Raleigh/Durham, NC
Friday, July 26, 1991
An application has been submitted to the Foreign-Trade Zones Board (the
Board) by the Triangle J Council of Governments, grantee of FTZ 93,
requesting special-purpose subzone status for the information processing
equipment manufacturing complex of International Business Machines
Corporation (IBM) in the Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina, area. The
application was submitted pursuant to the provisions of the Foreign-Trade
Zones Act, as amended (19 U.S.C. 81a-81u), and the regulations of the board
(15 CFR part 400). It was formally filed on July 8, 1991.
IBM is an international producer and distributor of information processing
equipment and systems with annual sales of some $63 billion.
The proposed subzone involves a main manufacturing facility and five
related facilities (total, 807 acres): Site 1 (688 acres)--main
manufacturing and distribution, Research Triangle Park (RTP), southeast of
Durham in Durham County; Site 2 (15 acres)--remanufacturing and storage,
IBM Building 646, South Miami Boulevard, RTP; Site 3 (18 acres)--raw
material storage, IBM Buildings 644 and 654, Alexander and Wreck Drives,
RTP; Site 4 (15 acres)--manufacturing and administration, 2520 Yonkers
Road, IBM Building 602, Raleigh; Site 5 (10 acres)--research and
development, 3808 Six Forks Road, IBM Building 051, Raleigh; Site 6 (61
acres)--finished product storage, operated by Triangle North American under
contract to IBM, Tri-Center Buildings III/IV, V and VI, Tricenter Boulevard
and Northeast Creek Parkway, RTP.
The facilities employ 13,000 persons and are used primarily for the
research and manufacture of IBM's Communications System Line of Business
Products, including Personal System/1 and Personal System/2 computers,
communications controllers and multiplexers, modems, token-ring networks,
supermarket and retail store systems, harsh environment computers, special
project computers, display and monitors, ASCII terminals, Entry systems
monitors, and miscellaneous parts. Up to 40 percent of the components for
these products are sourced abroad including hard and floppy disk drive
units, printed circuit boards and assemblies, monitors, mouse units,
keyboards, cathode ray tubes, dot matrix printers, power supplies, parts
and assemblies for automatic banking machines, electric motors, generators,
transformers, resistors, transistors, switching apparatus, electronic
integrated circuits and microassemblies, magnetic disks and diskettes, wire
and cable, insulators and fittings, optical fibers, lasers, fans, battery
packs, fasteners, hangers, screws, bolts, valves, bushings, bearings, and
certain articles of plastic and rubber. Certain components produced at the
Raleigh/Durham plants are shipped to other IBM plants, and some 12 percent
of the finished computer equipment is exported.
Zone procedures would exempt IMB from Customs duty payments on foreign
parts that are used in production for export. On its domestic sales, it
would be able to choose the duty rates that apply to finished products (0.0
to 10.0 percent, averaging 4.9 percent). The duty rates on foreign
components range from 0.0 to 14.0 percent. The application indicates that
savings from zone procedures will help improve the international
competitiveness of the company's U.S. plants.
In accordance with the Board's regulations, an examiners committee has been
appointed to investigate the application and report to the Board. The
committee consists of: Dennis Puccinelli (Chairman), Foreign-Trade Zones
Staff, U.S. Department of Commerce, Washington, DC 20230; Howard Cooperman,
Regional Director, Inspection and Control, U.S. Customs Service, Southeast
Region, 909 SE. First Avenue, Miami, Florida, 33131-2595; and Colonel W.
Scott Tulloch, District Engineer, U.S. Army Engineer District Wilmington,
P.O. Box 1890, Wilmington, NC 28402-1890.
Comments concerning the proposed subzone are invited in writing from
interested parties. They should be addressed to the Board's Executive
Secretary at the address below and postmarked on or before September 12,
1991.
A copy of the application is available for public inspection at each of the
following locations:
Office of the District Director,
U.S. Department of Commerce,
203 Federal Building,
324 W. Market Street, P.O. Box 1950,
Greensboro, NC 27402.
Office of the Executive Secretary,
Foreign-Trade Zones Board,
U.S. Department of Commerce,
14th & Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., room 3716,
Washington, DC 20230.
Dated: July 19, 1991.
John J. Da Ponte, Jr.,
Executive Secretary.
[FR Doc. 91-7808 Filed 7-25-91; 8:45 am]