Portuguese 
English 
Spanish 
6 min of reading 
0 comments 
According to the CanalTech portal, Foxconn, the world’s largest electronics manufacturer and responsible for assembling Apple’s iPhones, announced plans to transform its unit in Jundiaí (SP) into a production hub for electric cars for Latin America. The model is the same one the Taiwanese company applied to cell phones: contract manufacturing, where Foxconn produces the vehicle and the partner brand handles design, marketing, and sales. The strategy uses the modular MIH platform, developed by the company itself, which allows different models of electric cars to be assembled on the same base.
Foxconn wants to do with electric cars what it has already done with cell phones: manufacture for others. The Taiwanese giant that assembles iPhones, iPads, and video game consoles for brands like Apple, Sony, and Nintendo announced that it intends to transform its unit in Jundiaí, in the interior of São Paulo, into a production hub for electric vehicles for all of Latin America. The model is that of contract manufacturing: Foxconn takes care of the factory, engineering, and assembly, while the partner brand handles design, marketing, and sales to the consumer.
The bet is not small: Foxconn moves over US$200 billion per year in global revenue and has the industrial scale to produce practically anything with an electrical circuit. What changes now is the product. Instead of smartphones, the Jundiaí factory would start assembling electric cars on the modular MIH (Mobility in Harmony) platform, developed by Foxconn itself in partnership with over 2,700 companies in the global automotive ecosystem. The platform allows different brands to launch vehicles with their own visual identity on the same mechanical and electronic base.
What is contract manufacturing and why it changes the game
The model that Foxconn wants to apply to electric cars is the same one that has transformed the electronics industry over the past three decades. In contract manufacturing, the company that appears on the packaging is not the same one that assembled the product. Apple designs the iPhone, defines specifications, and controls the software, but it is Foxconn that solders the boards, assembles the screen, and packages the device, in factories spread across China, India, Vietnam, and, in the case of Brazil, in Jundiaí.
-
Hidden at the bottom of a dam in Turkey, the submerged ruins of a 2,400-year-old ancient city reveal mosques, tombs, gravestones, madrasas, civil buildings, and even a Byzantine bath, found by police officers during a training dive.
-
A young inventor has built a homemade two-seater solar car with electric bicycle parts, four 1,000 W motors, a range of up to 100 km, and completed a 29 km test powered solely by the energy from solar panels.
-
Liquid sugar enters Alzheimer’s radar: Framingham study with over 4 thousand participants links sodas, industrialized teas, and sugary drinks to smaller brain volume, worse memory, and silent signs of brain aging.
-
James Webb Telescope reveals rocky exoplanet ‘very close’ to Earth: The exoplanet LHS 3844 b has a dark, arid, and airless surface, with temperatures of up to 725 °C and is 48 light-years from Earth
Applied to the automotive sector, the model means that a fashion brand, a technology company, or even a startup with no assembly experience can launch an electric car under its name. Foxconn provides the platform, the factory, and the production capacity; the client provides the brand and the market. This is the opposite of what the automotive industry did for a century, when each automaker needed to have its own production lines, exclusive suppliers, and billions in factory investment.
The MIH platform: the base that allows any car to be assembled
The MIH (Mobility in Harmony) is the central piece of Foxconn‘s strategy for the automotive sector. The platform is a modular chassis with an integrated electric motor, battery, suspension, and electronic systems, upon which different car bodies can be mounted. The concept is similar to what the Volkswagen Group does with the MEB platform (used in ID.3, ID.4, and others), but with a fundamental difference: the MIH is open and available to any brand that wants to contract Foxconn as a manufacturer.
The MIH consortium already brings together more than 2,700 partner companies worldwide, including suppliers of batteries, semiconductors, automotive software, and safety components. Foxconn has already presented three prototypes based on the platform: the Model C (SUV), the Model E (luxury sedan), and the Model T (electric bus), demonstrating that the base is versatile enough to serve everything from urban transport to passenger vehicles. In Taiwan, assembly of the Model C has already begun in partnership with Yulon Motor, under the Luxgen brand.
Why Jundiaí and why Latin America
The choice of Jundiaí is not random. Foxconn has been operating in the city since 2005, when it installed the factory that assembles iPhones and other electronics for the Brazilian market. The infrastructure exists, the local supplier chain is partially established, and the location in the interior of São Paulo offers privileged logistical access: Jundiaí is 60 km from São Paulo, at the junction of the Anhanguera and Bandeirantes highways, with direct access to the port of Santos and Viracopos airport.
For Latin America, Brazil is the natural gateway. The country is the largest automotive market in the region, with over 2 million vehicles sold per year, and electrification is still in its early stages, meaning there is room to grow without competing with an established base of electric vehicles. Foxconn sees in the region what it saw in Asia two decades ago: a huge market with insufficient local production and dependence on imports.
What Foxconn has already done in the automotive sector outside Brazil
Foxconn’s electric car strategy is not just an announcement: it is already being executed in other countries. In Taiwan, the Model C is produced in partnership with Yulon Motor and sold under the Luxgen n7 brand, with deliveries starting in 2024. In Thailand, Foxconn partnered with state-owned PTT to build an electric vehicle factory with a capacity of 50,000 units per year. In Saudi Arabia, the agreement with the sovereign wealth fund PIF foresees the assembly of Ceer brand vehicles.
In the United States, Foxconn bought the former Lordstown Motors factory in Ohio and signed contracts with Fisker (before the brand’s bankruptcy) and INDI EV. The history shows that the company is building global automotive production capacity, with factories on at least four continents. Jundiaí would be the Latin American piece of this puzzle, completing a network that stretches from Taipei to Riyadh, from Bangkok to Columbus.
The challenges Foxconn faces in Brazil
Transforming Jundiaí into an electric car hub is not just a matter of corporate will. Brazil has one of the highest vehicle tax burdens in the world, and the structure of tax incentives (such as the Mover program, which replaced Rota 2030) still favors flex-fuel and hybrid engines over purely electric ones. Foxconn will need to negotiate conditions that make local production competitive against the direct import of Chinese vehicles, which arrive in Brazil with aggressive prices.
There is also the supply chain challenge. Lithium batteries, the most expensive component of an electric car, are not produced at scale in Brazil, despite the country having significant lithium reserves in the Jequitinhonha Valley (MG). Without local production of battery cells, Foxconn would depend on Asian imports for the most critical input, which reduces the advantage of manufacturing locally. The solution may involve partnerships with battery manufacturers already planning operations in Brazil, such as China’s CATL and South Korea’s LG Energy Solution.
What this means for the Brazilian automotive industry
If Foxconn manages to execute the plan, the impact on the Brazilian automotive industry will be structural. Brands that do not currently exist in the car market will be able to launch electric vehicles with national manufacturing, using the MIH platform and the capacity of the Jundiaí factory. This opens space for technology companies, retailers, and even Brazilian startups to enter the sector without investing billions in assembly lines.
For traditional automakers installed in Brazil — Volkswagen, Fiat, GM, Hyundai, Toyota —, the movement represents both a threat and an opportunity. A threat because it democratizes access to automotive production. An opportunity because Foxconn itself can become a supplier of electronic components and embedded systems for those who already have a factory and want to electrify their line. The future will tell if Jundiaí becomes the Shenzhen of electric cars or if the plan runs into Brazil’s tax and logistical reality.
Would you buy an electric car manufactured by Foxconn in Jundiaí, even if the brand on the door was from a company you’ve never seen assemble a vehicle? Tell us in the comments what you think about the contract manufacturing model coming to cars and if this can make electric cars cheaper in Brazil.
Be the first to react!