By Mikey Campbell
Published: 05:17 PM EST (02:17 PM PST)
Chinese manufacturer and Apple partner Foxconn plans to expand the size of its iPhone-producing Zhengzhou plant, with the $1.1 billion construction expected to make it the largest smartphone-producing facility in the world.
Chinese language newspaper
China Daily reported on Monday that Apple's Chinese manufacturing partner
plans to double the size of its smartphone plant at Foxconn Science Park in Zhengzhou, which currently produces over 200,000 iPhones a day.
Foxconn's plans call for a $1.1 billion addition to the facility located in Central China's Henan province, with boosted revenue from the massive expansion expected to bring in $20 billion in sales revenue in 2012.
Apple's primary iPhone manufacturer will increase the number of production lines to 95 and add to its over 1 million mainland China employees, 130,000 of whom work at the Zhengzhou facility. Foxconn currently employs a total of 1.2 million people and supplies electronics to a number of
worldwide companies.
The Taiwan-based company also operates a production facility in Brazil which also produces
certain iPhone models, and is currently trying to iron out
local legal issues so that it can fulfill a
$12 billion investment to build an iPad manufacturing plant in the region.
Recent rumors suggest that Foxconn will
begin producing the next-gen iPad 3 in January, which
is expected to include a display with a similar pixel density to iPhone 4 and 4S Retina Displays.
