Dell said Jan. 23 it would hire 1,000 Malaysians to operate its first global IT support center outside of the United States. Dell CEO Kevin Rollins said the center at Malaysia's high-tech hub of Cyberjaya south of Kuala Lumpur would be operational by the end of the year with an initial 600 staff handling 24-hour IT support and maintenance.

"The Cyberjaya facility not only shows our commitment to Asia and Malaysia but as we look at the global business ... it's going to help Dell's business conditions globally," he said.

Dell currently has 5,500 employees in Malaysia. The new IT center, which will provide internal support to Dell staff globally, is targeted to expand to some 1,000 employees in five years time.

Its manufacturing plant in the northern city of Penang produces nine million computers annually and Rollins said he hoped to act on its capacity to expand production. "We have this capability to expand by another 30%-40% at our manufacturing facility," he said.

Rollins said Dell's Asian market share was doing well and that they were "satisfied and happy with the way our business has been doing."

"We are growing in Asia. China is growing fast; we have announced a new factory in India, in Chennai," he said.

Dell began operating in Malaysia in 1995 with a manufacturing and direct-sales business. It now produces desktops, workstations, notebooks, servers and storage products in Penang for customers in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as notebooks for the U.S. market.

In 2005, it accounted for 28% to Malaysia's electronic equipment exports and 7% of total national economic output.