Foxconn Fears Q4 Flop Due To COVID Complications

Electronics manufacturing giant Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd – better known as Foxconn – has reported strong growth in plenty of product categories but warned its Chinese operations may drag it down during Q4.

The company's monthly revenue report [PDF] for October 2022 had plenty of good news: revenue of NT$776,577 million ($24.3 billion) was up 41 percent year on year. Computing, networking, and cloud products all recorded "significant month on month growth" in the double digits.

The company's Smart Consumer Electronics range did likewise, with an unspecified product launch thanked for the jump. The iPhone 14 is a clear candidate as the source of the good news, as are recent CPU launches from AMD and Intel that could have spurred PC sales a little.

Given the deluge of downward forecasts from PC and smartphone vendors, news that one of their suppliers has seen some sunny days is pleasing.

• Intel's 13th-gen CPUs are hot, hungry, loaded with cores
• Global smartphone sales come tumbling down as reality bites
• PC shipments fall at fastest rate ever as businesses slam wallets shut
• Crowds not allowed to leave Shanghai Disneyland without a negative COVID test

But of course every silver lining has a cloud around it. Other products didn't do so well, recording what was described as a "slight decline" due to high sales the previous month.

And the company also dropped the following nasty news:

Zhengzhou is home to a colossal Foxconn plant focussed on making iPhones for Apple … and Apple yesterday warned that production will miss targets due to strict lockdowns aimed at controlling a COVID-19 outbreak.

"Foxconn is now working with the [Henan provincial] government in concerted effort to stamp out the pandemic and resume production to its full capacity as quickly as possible," the revenue statement reads.

Foxconn and Apple will both be hoping those efforts succeed, because both have made disclosures that the shutdowns in Zhengzhou could hit their bottom lines – hard. ®