• The Taiwanese giant hopes to help turn the connected car market on its head by doing for auto brands what it did for Apple with the iPhone 
• It will essentially take the tricky and relatively labour-intensive task of vehicle production off the brand-owner’s hands at low cost and is developing an equivalent of Android for connected vehicles
• It recently signed a breakthrough deal with Japanese auto company Mitsubishi

Japanese auto manufacturer Mitsubishi has teamed up with giant Taiwanese contract manufacturing specialist Foxconn to help sidestep a potential squeeze on its market position in Oceania, one of its key markets, where its rugged SUVs (sport utility vehicles) have proved especially popular. On one side, Mitsubishi has the US administration threatening trade tariffs, on the other, it must respond to fast-rising Chinese auto manufacturers that are outperforming it in the Asian market.

The deal will see Foxtron Vehicle Technologies, a subsidiary of Foxconn (aka Hon Hai Technology Group) supply Mitsubishi with smart electric vehicles (EVs) on an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) basis for sales in Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), speeding up time to market, keeping costs in check and potentially mitigating some tariff challenges by manufacturing the vehicles in Taiwan. 

New Taipei City-based Foxtron will “provide design and manufacturing management services”, with the EV model expected to enter the Australia and New Zealand markets in the second half of 2026.

More importantly for Foxconn, the company hopes this initial deal with Mitsubishi will be a breakthrough in its quest to establish itself as a connected car contract manufacturing partner for Japan’s auto giants, and pave the way for it to repeat the success it enjoyed in manufacturing computers and smartphones for the likes of Apple (Foxconn makes most of the world’s iPhones). 

To enhance its connected car market potential, in March this year Foxconn mounted a bid to curate an “Android system for electric vehicles” and worked up what was described as a radical offer for Honda and Nissan in the wake of their aborted merger talks. The Taiwanese company proposed a three-way partnership, with Foxconn providing design and production, as well as its expertise in manufacturing smart technology products, to both companies on a contractual basis – see Foxconn steers towards the connected car sector. 

Nothing concrete has yet emerged from that engagement with Honda and Nissan, but now the Mitsubishi deal may prove to be a side door, as it were, to further deals, given that Mitsubishi and Nissan, along with French car giant Renault, formed the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance in 1999. One of the world’s largest automotive partnerships, it is based on cross-shareholding and collaborative projects, allowing companies to share technology, platforms and resources while maintaining their independence. 

To prepare the EV ground, Foxconn has already launched a trial manufacturing centre in the Zhengzhou Airport Economic Zone in China, where it operates a contract design and manufacturing service (CDMS) model for EVs, completing 80% of the foundational work and leaving only 20% for its clients. 

According to renewable energy publication Reccessary, the facility has already introduced six EV models, including an SUV, a luxury sedan, an electric bus and an electric delivery vehicle.

Considering the fast shifting sands of the connected car market today -– with all entities scrambling to collaborate to stay technologically up to date and often looking to “multi-shore” production to stay as agile as possible and avoid tariffs – Foxconn may just be in the right place at the right time.

– Ian Scales, Contributing Editor, TelecomTV