Wal-Mart’s Mexican invasion just sped up with the opening of 15 new stores in 8 states. Wal-Mart is Mexico’s largest retailer and private-sector employer, with more than 170,000 workers at 1,205 supermarkets, restaurants, clothing stores and retail chains.

www.walmartmexico.com.mx

Following the January opening of its 550 million usd Oaxaca Eurus I wind farm, Cemex is preparing to expand the project and build out Eurus II, with funding from the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the United Nations Organization (UN). The new aeolian plant in La Ventosa (on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in Oaxaca) will have 33 turbines manufactured by the Spanish Acciona Windpower and will generate 49.5 megawatts of renewable energy. Eurus II could begin operations in December 2010 and help eliminate 860,000 tons of CO2. The wind farm will supply power to 13 of the 15 Cemex plants in Mexico and cut the emission of nearly six million tons of pollutant by 2018.

www.cemex.com

FEMSA will officially start its incursion in the industrial refrigerator market. Although the company already manufactured refrigerators for its beer and soda affiliates, it has launched a new company, Imbera, devoted to the manufacturing of low power consumption commercial chillers. The new company will have an initial production of 240,000 units per year, which will be sold on the open market in 19 Latin American countries. FEMSA is the largest beverage firm in Latin America. It is the largest Coca-Cola bottler in the region and the second largest in the world, accounting for one out of every ten Coca-Cola products sold globally.

www.femsa.com

New investments from Zodiac Aerospace are landing in Mexico. The French company, which has operations in the state of Chihuahua since 2005, will invest 12 million usd in the construction of a new plant of its subsidiary Weber and the expansion of its existing Air Cruisers plant. The new Weber plant will open in October this year in Chihuahua City’s Supra Industrial Park. Another French company, Manoir Industries, which like Zodiac already has operations in Chihuahua, will open a new 10 million usd plant in November in Chihuahua City. Manoir’s new plant will ship assembly-ready braking system sets to its customer in the United States, Messier Bugatti, a Groupe Safran company.

www.zodiacaerospace.com / www.manoir-industries.com

Corona, the beer produced by Mexican Grupo Modelo, became the number one-selling imported beer in Chile, with over 1 million cases sold in 2008 and a 20% estimated growth for 2009. The brand is among the top five premium beers in Chile, and is the 15th most sold in the Chilean beer market.

www.gmodelo.com.mx

By the end of 2009, Telefónica México will launch its “Movistar Voice to Text” service, which automatically converts voice messages into text. The service will be provided by SpinVox —world leader in Voice-to-Content services- with which Telefónica signed a global deal. SpinVox is the only speech-to-text service in the world available in six languages: Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, German, and Italian.

www.telefonica.com.mx

As part of a cooperation agreement between Mexico, Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama, the Colombian government will take part in the construction of a new biofuel plant in the Mexican state of Chiapas. The plant, which is due to be built by December this year, will produce biodiesel from Jatropha Curcas and will be built at a cost of 2 million usd, with Mexico and Colombia making an equal contribution. The Colombian Corporation of Agricultural Research will be in charge of the construction of the new plant, which will eventually be capable of producing up to 13,200 gallons of biofuel per day. The Government of Chiapas has already committed close to 10,000 hectares for the farming of Jatropha, as well as palm oil, to be used as raw materials in the production of biodiesel.

www.corpoica.org.co / www.ifat.chiapas.gob.mx

In 2009, Mexico’s e-commerce sector revenues have jumped by over 85%, mainly led by the Business-to-consumer and Consumer-toconsumer sector, as compared to 1.76 billion usd reported in the previous year, according to a study by Mexico’s Internet Association (AMIPCI) and Visa.

According to the same source, airline tickets represent 79% of the overall online sales in the country, while consumer items (especially entertainment, computers and electronics) account for the remaining 21%. Nearly 74% of online purchases are made with credit cards. The online purchases made by foreign shoppers on Mexican websites have increased by 14%, while domestic online purchases and transactions have jumped by almost 50%.

amipci.org.mx