Foxconn was supposed to spend $3.3 billion on the project by the end of 2019. Instead, Foxconn had only spent around $300 million by the end of the year.
Foxconn was supposed to build an LCD panel factory based on the industry's new Generation 10.5 standard. This standard uses enormous sheets of "mother glass"—roughly 10 feet (3 meters) square—to provide LCD panels for large televisions. Each glass sheet is typically cut into several displays. The factory was expected to cost $10 billion to build and eventually employ 13,000 workers in Wisconsin. The state now says that Foxconn won't come anywhere close to meeting those targets.
"The fact that recipients have neither built, nor started to build or operate, the required Generation 10.5 TFT-LCD Fabrication Facility is not in dispute," wrote Jennifer Campbell, chief legal officer of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. "The recipients have acknowledged that they have no formal or informal business plans to build a 10.5 fab."
Foxconn is now reportedly
planning to build a plant to manufacture LCD panels based on the Gen 6 standard. That standard uses mother glass that measures about 5 feet by 6 feet (1.5 meters by 1.8 meters)—a quarter the size of the originally planned Gen 10.5 glass. These smaller glass sheets, used for everything from laptop screens to dashboard displays in cars, are easier to work with and require less specialized equipment. That means the factory will be much less expensive to build and require fewer workers when it's complete.
In their letter, Wisconsin officials stressed their willingness to negotiate a new aid package that would be commensurate with Foxconn's new, less ambitious plans.
So much winning!!!!