Foxconn to Build New Factory – For Real

Foxconn to Build New Factory – For Real
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Foxconn Industrial Internet (601138.CH), a Foxconn spin-off that is focused on ‘industrial production’ and also functions as an arm of Foxconn’s massive device assembly facilities in China, signed an agreement with the Zhoukou Municipal government in Henan to build the Zhoukou Science & Technology Industrial Park, a $231m project that will add to Foxconn’s assembly facilities on the Mainland.  According to local media, the two phase project will employ up to 30,000 people when completed.  The expansion is said to be a part of Foxconn’s relationship with Apple, with Foxconn’s complex in Longhua Town, Shenzhen being the largest iPhone assembly facility.  That factory complex, known as “Foxconn City” covers over 1.2 mi2 and has 15 factories, dormitories, 4 swimming pools, its own TV network, a bank, grocery store, restaurants, and a hospital,, and is said to employ just under 500,000 workers, many of whom live in the dorms.
While we expect Foxconn is serious about building this new factory project, especially considering they have other facilities in nine Chinese cities, we harken back to the wonderful world of Foxconn in Wisconsin, where Foxconn is now promising to ‘revolutionize the automotive industry’ in cooperation with Fisker Inc (FSR), comparing their collaborative efforts with the work of Isaac Newton, and even hinting that they could even manufacture the cars in Wisconsin.  Foxconn’s massive project in Wisconsin, that served as a photo-op platform for former President Trump and then Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has never established any kind of production, even failing to produce cutting edge coffee kiosks and ventilators during the early COVID-19 days, so we are always a bit skeptical when Foxconn makes promises, as are those 13,000 workers in Wisconsin who had been counting on the jobs promised by the company.
Aside from the 2,500 people who were forced to sell their property when the project was started (eminent domain), here’s what Foxconn has promised since the project was started, despite having built only a few small buildings on the site, which remain mostly empty:

• Gen 10.5 LCD fab – Never Built
• TV assembly facility – Never Built
• Foxconn North American Headquarters – Bought buildings in Milwaukee – No Employees – Now leased to others
• Innovation Centers – To be built across Wisconsin – Buildings bought in Green Bay, Racine, Madison, and Eau Claire – No employees
• $100m grant to University of Wisconsin in Madison - $700k has been granted
• Joint development of Ginseng farming in Wisconsin – No word since 2018
• Coffee Kiosks - Project dissolved
• Ventilator Production with Medtronic (MDT) – Nothing
• Google server assembly – Still waiting