Foxconn produces and assembles products for many top consumer electronics brands today. Sharp and Foxconn now intends to enter a display partnership that will give Foxconn access to half of the LCD panels from Sharp’s 10G LCD plant in Sakai.

Foxconn & Sharp partnership
Foxconn and Sharp have officially announced a new display partnership. Foxconn will invest around 800 million USD in Sharp and will take a 10 percent share of the company.


Sharps 10G LCD plant in Sakai, Japan

More interestingly, Foxconn will also take up to 50 percent of the LCD capacity at Sharp’s Sakai LCD plant that is currently used for producing large-size LCD-TVs. It will not affect Sharp’s LCD-TV plans because the plant have not been running at full capacity but Foxconn will gain access to the most advanced LCD plant today that can handle small and medium-size LCD panels as well as extremely large-size LCD panels up to more than 100 inches.

The business structure will be a joint venture, with Sharp and Foxconn taking up 46.5 % ownership each, and Sony taking up the remaining 7 %. Sony also reports that it has no plans to invest more money in their partnership with Sharp, and that they actually have the right to sell its 7 % share in the event of a new company entering (which Foxconn has just done).

Why Foxconn and Sharp have entered the new display partnership remains unclear but it is unusual for a Japanese company to strengthen its ties with a Taiwanese as it is the case here. Foxconn manufactures products such as iPad, iPhone, Kindle, PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360. In 2011 it was also reported that Sharp is a key display partner for the coming Apple HDTV that is believed to be manufactured at Foxconn’s plants.