Foxconn (Hon Hai Precision Industry)

The founder

Terry Gou founded Hon Hai Plastics in 1974 with $7,500 borrowed from his mother and 10 workers, initially making plastic components for televisions. A 1980 order from Atari for joystick components was an early breakthrough, and he opened Foxconn’s first mainland China plant in Shenzhen in 1988. Through the 1990s and 2000s he built relationships with Apple, HP, Dell, Sony and Microsoft, turning Foxconn into the dominant global electronics contract manufacturer with over a million workers at its peak. He stepped down as chairman in 2019 after 45 years, remaining a major shareholder.

How it was taken public

Hon Hai listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange in 1991 (the exact amount raised isn’t reliably documented in available records for this early listing), giving the company access to institutional capital that fueled its expansion into mainland China manufacturing through the 1990s and set up its rise into the company that assembles the majority of the world’s iPhones today.