Tuesday, June 12, 2007, 12:00 am

Foxconn: We're not Apple's iPhone manufacturer

By AppleInsider Staff

Foxconn International Holdings Ltd., the Hong Kong-listed arm of Taiwan's Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., said this week it is not Apple Inc.'s manufacturing partner for iPhone.

Speaking to shareholders on Tuesday, the firm said it plans to spend $1 billion to at least double capacity over the course of this year and next by expanding in China and India. However, Reuters reports that chief executive Samuel Chin also told its investors that the company was not making iPhones for Apple.

Chin stopped short of ruling out a future partnership with the Cupertino-based electronics maker on future handsets.

In January, the Chinese-language Commercial Times reported that Foxconn would become the main supplier of the hotly anticipated inaugural Apple handset. The media report sent Foxconn shares on a 5 percent surge.

On Tuesday, the China-based firm said it is building a $1.2 billion plant in northern China to ramp up its capacity in addition to factories in Shenzhen and Beijing.

The $1 billion budgeted for expansion over 2007 and 2008 would go towards that plant, as well as to new factories in India and elsewhere, Chin said.