Foxconn to invest $10 billion in Wisconsin Factory

Foxconn is a major manufacturer of electronics for a wide variety of technology firms that sell products in the US. Perhaps the biggest customer that Foxconn builds electronics for is Apple, Foxconn makes the iPhone. Foxconn Technology Group has pledged to invest $10 billion in a new display panel factory that will be constructed in Wisconsin.

The new factory could employ as many as 13,000 workers and could grab as much as $3 billion in subsidies from the state. President Trump has been focused on bringing manufacturing jobs back to the US since the early days of his Presidential campaign and this is seen as a major win by the Trump administration. Trump said, “This is a great day for American workers and manufacturers and everyone who believes in the concept and the label ‘Made in the USA.'”

The factory is a big deal for the Wisconsin state economy and out of work Americans in the state, but it poses challenges as well. The subsidy package offered to Foxconn to lure it to build the factory in Wisconsin is said to be almost 50 times larger than anything the state has offered to a company in the past. The Journal Sentinel reports that the factory will be a virtual village with housing, stores, and service business spread over at least 1,000 acres. That acreage is a 1.5-square mile area that will be assembled from parcels of land that aren’t contiguous according to sources.

The factory itself will be gigantic at 20 million square feet making it the largest manufacturing campus in the US. For starters, the factory will employ 3,000 workers that are said to make an average of $53,900 yearly plus benefits. The factory will make LCDs used in computer screens, TVs, and cars. The construction of the facility could add 10,000 jobs over the next four years alone. It’s unclear at this time when the factory construction would start.