Wistron's board approved the Vietnam investment via its offshore unit, VNCap, the Hsinchu-based company said in a statement to the Taiwan Stock Exchange late Friday, without elaborating.

Wistron is expected to ship as many as 19 million units this year, up from about 11-12 million units last year and 9 million in 2006, the Taipei-based, Chinese-language Commercial Times newspaper said Saturday, without citing anyone. Wistron is the world's third-largest contract manufacturer of notebook computers behind Quanta Computer Inc., and Compal Electronics Inc.