Chinese manufacturer plans $15M Walton County facility

Gov. Nathan Deal and Facebook announced a nearly 1 million-square-foot data center near Social Circle. J. Scott Trubey/strubey@ajc.com

Gov. Nathan Deal and Facebook announced a nearly 1 million-square-foot data center near Social Circle. J. Scott Trubey/strubey@ajc.com

Gov. Nathan Deal announced Friday a Chinese plastics manufacturer’s plans to build a large new facility in Social Circle.

The announcement comes about six weeks after official confirmation that social media giant Facebook is planning to build a sprawling new data center in the Walton County town about 40 miles east of Atlanta.

Officials said Top Polymer Enterprise plans to initially create 70 jobs and invest $15 million in its new plant. The facility will be the first in the United States for the company, which exports to more than 30 countries.

“This is an exceptional time for Top Polymer Enterprise and we are extremely excited to be part of the Social Circle community,” Marcus Tsong, president of Top Polymer Holding Company, said in a news release. “We see our Social Circle facility as being the first key step to becoming an internationally recognized manufacturer and supplier of premier [thermoplastic elastomer] systems.”

Facebook, which has since come under fire for its handling of users’ personal information, formally announced last month its plans to invest $750 million over the next five years in its Social Circle data center, which will be operational in 2020.

It will be one of nine U.S. data centers that will support billions of Facebook users.

In other news: