The mega factory that never was

Foxconn is causing a political headache for President Trump, as the Taiwanese manufacturer fails to deliver on a promise to build a 13,000-employee factory in Wisconsin.

The LCD screen plant - which was intended to hire 13,000 local blue collar workers - was heralded by the US president as a win in his struggle to return manufacturing jobs to America. But while the Wisconsin authorities have spent millions of dollars preparing the ground, Foxconn itself has obfuscated.

Ed Butler investigates what went wrong, and what it says more broadly about President's Trump's ambition to revitalise the US manufacturing sector. The programme includes journalist Josh Dzieza of The Verge, Harvard Business School professor Willy Shih, and chief economist Megan Greene of Manulife Asset Management.

(Foxconn CEO Terry Gou (L) at the groundbreaking for the Foxconn computer screen plant in Mt Pleasant, Wisconsin, in June 2018; Credit: Andy Manis/Getty Images)