Foxconn finds EVs are harder to build than iPhones

Over the past decade, Foxconn Technology Group has followed increasingly complex plans from Apple Inc. to turn silicon, glass, plastic, copper and other materials into hundreds of millions of iPhones. And Apple is just one of the Taiwanese company’s dozens of A-list customers; Google, Microsoft, Sony and many others have hired it to make phones, computers, tablets, game consoles, servers and more. So it’s not much of a stretch to think Foxconn might do the same for cars.

So far, though, cars are turning out to be a tougher slog than electronic gadgets.

Last year, Foxconn paid $230 million for a former General Motors Co. factory in Lordstown, Ohio, aiming to make it the center of a US auto-manufacturing push. As part of the deal, the previous owner of the 6.2 million-square-foot plant, four-year-old Lordstown Motors Corp., hired Foxconn to build its Endurance pickup truck, and the Taiwanese company took a stake in the startup.

Foxconn has made grand predictions for its auto business, saying it will generate $33 billion in annual revenue by 2025. And it’s announced partnerships in Taiwan, Thailand and Saudi Arabia. Although its electric vehicle components business is on track to grow fivefold to more than $3 billion this year, at this point the only vehicles Foxconn has made are a handful of prototypes, a few dozen electric buses and about 40 pickups for Lordstown.

Foxconn’s entry Into EVs

• May 2022: Completes deal with Lordstown Motors to acquire Ohio factory for $230 million.
• October 2022: Unveils two EVs to be built in Taiwan, Thailand and the US.
• November 2022: Teams up with Saudi wealth fund to build EVs.
• November 2022: Agrees to invest as much as $170 million in Lordstown and takes two board seats.
• January 2023: Hires former Nissan exec Jun Seki as chief strategy officer for EVs.

In January, Lordstown asked Foxconn to suspend production because the cost of making the trucks exceeded the targeted sale price of $65,000. A few weeks later it became clear that the Endurance suffered from, well, a lack of endurance. At least one owner reported that the truck had lost power while driving in cold weather, prompting the company in February to issue a recall. Then on March 6, Lordstown said that if it can’t team up with an experienced automaker, it would be forced to discontinue the pickup, its only model.

The announcement raises questions about Foxconn’s nascent EV business. Lordstown was effectively…