Foxconn had kicked off its annual employment drive to hire more staff at its Chinese production facilities as it prepares to gear up mass production for the “iPhone 12.”
Foxconn’s main production facility in Zhengzhou has put out a call for applicants for positions on its assembly lines. The new hiring will swell the number of employees in the facility to close to a million, up from the off-season employee count of “only” in the tens of thousands. Foxconn is reportedly offering employees who recruit qualified applicants up to a 9,000 yuan ($1,290) bonus per person brought aboard.
Foxconn typically makes a hiring push each year in the months before the September launch of the new iPhones. This year’s push is a bit behind last year’s when the recruitment drive began in July.
The “iPhone 12” is expected to debut in September, and is anticipated to include two “iPhone 12” models with 6.1-inch and 5.4-inch OLED displays, along with two iPhone Pro models.
The delays in the production of components for the new iPhones brought on by the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic has lead to speculation that the lower-priced models may hit shelves a week or so after the September unveiling, with the higher-priced Pro models shipping a few weeks after the cheaper iPhones.