Foxconn: 5 Things To Know About Wisconsin's Newest Company

RACINE COUNTY, WI — Foxconn Technology Group, the world’s largest electronics manufacturing services provider, announced Wednesday it will invest $10 billion by 2020 to build a world-class manufacturing campus in Southeastern Wisconsin.

Many questions have come up over the past few weeks about Foxconn and Wisconsin's upcoming deal. Patch.com has done its best to give you the 5 questions we have heard the most:

1) What Is Foxconn?

Foxconn Technology Group, is a Taiwanese multinational electronics company headquartered in Taiwan. Foxconn is the world's largest contract electronics manufacturer. Foxconn specializes in design, manufacturing and assembly of global computer and high-tech consumer electronics products. The company is well known as the assembler of iPhones. Foxconn has chosen Wisconsin to build a new high-tech manufacturing and technology campus to build Liquid Crystal Displays (LCD). This will be the first LCD facility of any kind in North America and will manufacture LCD screens that will be used in everything from self-driving cars to aircraft systems and in the fields of education, entertainment, health care, safety and surveillance.

Related Reading

• Watch Trump's Announcement on Wednesday
• Foxconn Looking for 1,000 acres in Racine County
• Other States Vied for Company
• Company Could Bring 50,000 Jobs

2) What Is Foxconn Planning For Wisconsin?

Foxconn plans to invest $10 billion in Wisconsin over the next six years. The company will construct
a manufacturing campus comprising multiple buildings totaling 20 million sq. feet to produce liquid crystal
display (LCD) panels for a variety of industries - from automotive to health care to entertainment. This will be the first LCD factory in the U.S., and the only one globally that is not located in Asia. Currently, LCD panel glass fabrication plants only exist in four countries: Japan, Taiwan, China and South Korea.
Foxconn expects to hire 13,000 people in Wisconsin – thousands of whom will be engineers and skilled workers – over the next six years. This figure does not include jobs generated by an estimated
150 suppliers, nor multiplier jobs that would ripple across the region and state.

3) What Will Construction Be Like?

The project will require an estimated $10 billion of capital investment to construct and equip the facility. Of this, an estimated $5.7 billion will be for construction and equipment sourced from Wisconsin businesses.
The project will support 10,000 construction jobs over each of the next four years as well as 6,000 indirect jobs from the construction. The capital investment during construction is expected to generate
$348 million in state and local tax revenues. Foxconn wants to be operational in Wisconsin by 2020.

4) What is Wisconsin Offering in Incentives?

A vote on incentives for Foxconn is expected in August. At that time, state legislators will likely be grappling with an incentive package topping out at $3 billion - the largest incentive package ever recorded for a single project. The incentives are projected to cost between $200 million and $250 million a year. Once the company is fully staffed, Foxconn’s payroll will be an estimated $700 million a year.
The maximum amount of credits Foxconn will be eligible to earn is $3 billion over 15 years: Up to $1.5 billion in state income tax credits for job creation Up to $1.35 billion in state income tax credits for capital investment. Up to $150 million for the sales and use tax exemption (sales tax holiday).

5) Where will it be located?

When public officials from Wisconsin appeared at a Wednesday press conference in Washington D.C., their emphasis was obtaining a site in Southeastern Wisconsin. According to media reports we are hearing, Racine County is a strong candidate to land the massive company. East of I-94 and south of Highway 20 is an area of speculation among local media outlets. Wherever they end up building, the Tax Incremental Financing District tools available to the municipality where Foxconn will be located will be expanded to ensure there is capital available for local infrastructure.

Watch: Tech Company To Invest $10B, Build Factory In Wisconsin

------

image via wikipedia creative commons