Taiwan’s Foxconn and others accelerate investment in Mexico
SOURCE: Nikkei Asia,
TAIPEI — Taiwanese tech suppliers are increasing their production capacity in Mexico to meet growing demand for electric vehicles and servers to be made in North America.
The moves by key iPhone assembler Foxconn and others are in response to changes in U.S. policy and requests from clients, which together are gradually shifting parts of the supply chain from East to West.
Foxconn, the world’s biggest contract electronics manufacturer, recently established a headquarters in Mexico to centralize the management of its subsidiaries and business groups there, and to maximize its resources to better serve clients in North American markets.
The iPhone assembler, which also counts Google and Amazon’s AWS as clients, has been prioritizing electric vehicles as its next growth driver in recent years amid the slowing smartphone market. American EV startups Lordstown, Fisker and INDI EV are among Foxconn’s automotive clients.
“Foxconn has secured new EV clients there. Mexico is one of the key locations for the company’s strategic investments this year,” a person with direct knowledge of the matter told Nikkei Asia. “Foxconn will have three local manufacturing options for EV clients in North America: Ohio, Wisconsin and Mexico.”
The Taiwanese manufacturing giant’s compatriots — including iPhone assembler Pegatron, MacBook maker Quanta Computer, iPad supplier Compal Electronics and Inventec, a notebook manufacturer for HP and Dell — all have plans to grow their manufacturing presence in Mexico this year. These companies are key players in the production of servers and data centers and, like Foxconn, have allocated more resources to capture demand from the booming EV industry in recent years.
