MUMBAI: In a major boost to Maharashtra’s position as the country’s biggest foreign direct investment (FDI) destination, the world’s largest electronics contract manufacturing company, Foxconn, on Saturday assured an investment of $5 billion in the State in the next five years. Foxconn’s chief financial officer David Haung signed an MoU in this regard with State industries secretary Apurva Chandra in the presence of the company’s chairman Terry Gou and Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. It is the largest investment plan by a foreign company in the State since Fadnavis assumed the office in October 2014.
Foxconn manufactures gadgets for the world’s leading electronics brands, including Apple, Xiaomi, Huawei, Motorola and BlackBerry. The State government is likely to allot 1,500 acres of land for the Taiwan-headquartered company near Talegaon, between Mumbai and Pune. The company will focus on manufacturing as well as research and development. The MoU is an outcome of Fadnavis’ visit to Foxconn’s facility in China three months ago.
Fadnavis said the investment will boost the ‘Make In India’ campaign. “This investment will generate 50,000 direct jobs. Various studies have shown that if we don’t start manufacturing electronics items in India by 2030, our electronic items import bill will surpass our crude oil import bill,” he said. Gou said he had met Fadnavis seven times after the latter’s China visit. A team of 70 people was working on the project since then. “We managed to seal the deal within two months. We have chosen Maharashtra for being a financial centre, availability of quality manpower and software-hardware integration facilities,” he said. This was the second MoU signed by the State in the last two weeks, after an MoU with General Motors for investment of `6,400 crore for the expansion of its manufacturing unit in Pune.
During his visit, Gou met officials from Tata Sons, TCS, Bharat Forge and Shapoorji Pallonji. He also visited IIT-Mumbai. Foxconn has also entered into a partnership with filmmaker Subhash Ghai-promoted Whistling Woods International.