A key iPhone supplier and assembler Foxconn has poached a former top executive at Taiwanese chip-making giant TSMC and Chinese chipmaker SMIC Chiang Shang-yi, in a bid to lead its growing push in the chip business, says a report by news agency Reuters.
Taipei, Taiwan-headquartered Foxconn is the world’s biggest contract electronics maker and it is best known for assembling Apple iPhones and other Apple products, though in recent years it has been expanding into chips to diversify its business. Foxconn was quoted as saying in a statement by the Reuters report that Chiang had been appointed its semiconductor strategy officer, a newly created role.
In another news, Foxconn’s biggest unit in China was recently hit by migrant workers fleeing the manufacturing facility in Zhenzhou due to strict measures and lockdown in the wake of coronavirus. Aiming to pacify them, Foxconn Zhengzhou factory was offering migrant workers a one-off $70 subsidy if they agree to return to work, in a bid to minimise the impact on the output of iPhone production.
The migrant workers employed with the Foxconn Zhengzhou plant and who had fled the facility between October 10 to November 5 were asked to register at local labour agencies if they are willing to return, said a previous report. The workers willing to return to the facility will be provided with a transportation facility once the lockdown in the Zhengzhou Airport Economic Zone, where Foxconn is located, is lifted.
Meanwhile, according to news agency Reuters which cited a source, iPhone supplier Foxconn’s Covid-19 woes at its vast iPhone manufacturing plant in Zhengzhou city could cut the unit’s November iPhone shipments by up to 30 per cent. In order to meet demand, Foxconn is, however, working to boost iPhone production at its facility in the southern city of Shenzhen, the Reuters report added citing the source.