Enlarge image
"Model E":
Foxconn borrows the name for its e-sedan and two other prototypes from the successful models of the leading e-car manufacturer Tesla
Photo: FABIAN HAMACHER / REUTERS
The Taiwanese electronics company and iPhone manufacturer Foxconn has long dreamed of building electric cars. "If we can manufacture iPhones, why can't we also build electric vehicles? It's an iPhone with four wheels," said founder and ex-CEO
Terry Gou
(71) once said. At the beginning of the week, Foxconn, better known in Asia as Hon Hai Precision Industry, made the car world sit up and take notice and presented three electric vehicles - all of them prototypes, whose production is scheduled to begin in 2023.
The Foxconn offshoot "Foxtron" presented an SUV, a limousine and an electric minibus on Monday night. The joint venture founded in February 2020 with the Taiwanese car manufacturer Yolun Motors showed the three prototypes as part of the "Hon Hai Tech Day". With this move, the group with 1.2 million employees underscores its ambitions to break away from its role as a leading manufacturer of consumer electronics. Hai Precision Industry now also wants to become a major player in the e-vehicle market. According to CNBC, the company has therefore already signed contracts with the US startup Fisker and the Thai energy company PTT.
Foxconn then borrowed the names for its prototypes rather modestly from those of the successful Tesla electric cars. The "Model C" SUV for the mass market is expected to hit the market in Taiwan at the beginning of 2023 and will cost the equivalent of less than 30,000 euros. The "Model T" bus is due to go into operation in southern Taiwan at the beginning of next year. For the sedan "Model E" developed jointly with the Italian design company Pininfarina, with which Foxconn founder Gou drove to the stage to the sound of "Happy Birthday", there were no details yet.
At the beginning of October, Foxconn bought a factory of the US start-up Lordstown Motors for the equivalent of almost 200 million euros in order to start producing electric cars with the help of this plant. A few months earlier, the group took over a chip factory in Taiwan to meet future demand for microchips for electric cars. A joint venture established in January with the Chinese company Geely aims to sell manufacturing and consulting services related to propulsion systems, software platforms and even entire vehicles. The contract manufacturer also works with the car manufacturer Stellantis (Fiat, Chrysler, Peugeot, Citroen) - another joint venture is developing cockpit software for networked cars.
In the spring of this year, Foxconn boss
Young Liu
(65), who took over from Gou two years ago, announced that he wanted to achieve a global market share of around 10 percent in electric vehicles by manufacturing components or entire vehicles.
The manager did not give a specific date for this ambitious goal.
Foxconn's push into contract manufacturing for electric cars comes at a time when profit margins in its core consumer electronics business are shrinking.
Foxconn's sales rose only slightly last year by 0.3 percent to $ 181 billion.
The net profit has been declining since 2017.
Electric vehicles are of crucial importance for the group if Foxconn wants to increase its gross margin from the current 6 percent to 10 percent, the "Financial Times" recently analyzed.
rei