By Herman Lai, posted May 10, 2012 at 1:41 AM, 553 views,

Foxconn Sets Up New Headquarters in Shanghai

Apple supplier Foxconn just held a groundbreaking ceremony to begin construction of its China operational headquarters. The new building will be established on a 10,000 square meter (2.47 acre) site located in the Pudong district of Shanghai, it’s scheduled to be completed in the early 2015. Although Shenzhen will remain the manufacturing and operational core, the new location will be served as a research and development center, sales and as a hub for its e-commerce business in China. Indeed, Foxconn already has a sales channel business with a joint venture Media Markt in Shanghai.

Foxconn is known for being a huge supplier of iPad and iPhone products for Apple, and also has big names such as Sony, HP and Microsoft to its name. The factory currently employed about 1.2 million workers in their factories across China. The company has been embroiled in scandal over the past few years due to harsh working conditions within its factories and alarming employees commit suicides. In addition, the company CEO Terry Gou has made an obnoxious statement likening his workers to animals. And earlier this year, Foxconn promised to rise wages for its assembly line workers, and said would restrict workers’ overtime.

Last year, Foxconn has been looking to replace human labor with robotics, and the company said it would deploy 1 million robots over the next three years. Foxconn has been adopting new manufacturing technologies including robotics and automation.

Source: PC World