After almost five years of flirting with the idea and two failed nomination bids, the founder of Apple’s biggest supplier is running to be Taiwan’s president.
Terry Gou, Foxconn’s founder and former chair, announced Monday that he would run as an independent candidate in Taiwan’s presidential elections next January after his second attempt to lead the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) once again proved futile. Gou joins a crowded race to replace outgoing president Tsai Ing-wen, who is ineligible to run again due to term limits.
As an independent candidate, the Foxconn founder now needs to get 290,000 signatures from voters by Nov. 2 to make his bid official.
The race is critical not only for cross-strait relations, but also for the globe. The United States depends on chipmakers like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), East Asia's largest company by market cap, to power its high-tech economy.
Beijing has taken a more aggressive posture towards the self-governing island during Tsai’s presidency. The Chinese government considers Taiwan a breakaway province, and has not ruled out using military force to prevent it from declaring formal independence.
Gou had harsh words for the Democratic Progressive Party, which has governed Taiwan since Tsai won the presidency in 2016. Her more anti-Beijing stance contrasts with the KMT, which supports closer ties with mainland China.
“Over the past seven years, I’ve witnessed Taiwan go from being prosperous to being on the brink of falling off a cliff,” Gou said Monday, citing his dissatisfaction with the economy, defense, and foreign policy.
“If we don’t pull back now, it will be too late to save Taiwan from falling. We have to take down the Democratic Progressive Party,” he continued.
Gou said he was running to prevent Taiwan from becoming “the next Ukraine,” promised to bring “50 years of peace to the Taiwan Strait,” and pledged to help the island overtake Singapore in terms of GDP per capita.
Who is Terry Gou?
Terry Gou founded Hon Hai Precision Industry, better known internationally as Foxconn, in 1974.
The supplier opened its first plant in mainland China in 1988. It employs hundreds of thousands of workers in its mainland Chinese plants, including its gargantuan complex in Zhengzhou, where it makes iPhones for Apple.
Gou is worth almost $7 billion, according to estimates from Bloomberg. He remains the largest shareholder of the Apple iPhone manufacturer, which depends on China for roughly 70% of its revenue.
Gou has sought the presidency before. He stepped down as Foxconn’s chair in 2019, ahead of the previous election. At the time, however, he came in second during the KMT's presidential primary.
The billionaire businessman declined to run as an independent candidate at the time, and the party eventually lost to the DPP and Tsai.
Cross-strait relations
Gou supports closer ties with Beijing. In an opinion piece written for the Washington Post in July, he called for talks to resume between Beijing and Taipei under the “One China” framing, which states that there is just one country that covers both mainland China and Taiwan—though both sides disagree on what exactly that means.
Gou is "less antagonistic" toward Beijing than the DPP, "especially as his company Hon Hai is one of the largest employers in mainland China," Hilton Yip, a Taiwan-based journalist and news analyst, says. "It's not surprising he has said he will try to rebuild relations with China which have declined significantly during Tsai Ing-wen's tenure," he continues.
Beijing accuses the DPP of pursuing formal independence, a red line. Mainland China has slapped economic and diplomatic sanctions on the self-governing island, and conducted military exercises in its vicinity.
The DPP argues that it already has the right to conduct independent relations with other governments, but has stopped short of formally declaring independence.
Officially, the U.S. acknowledges, though does not "endorse," Beijing’s position on Taiwan, and does not recognize the island as its own state.
Yet Washington fosters close economic and political ties to Taipei, including selling arms. U.S. politicians, like former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, have also traveled to Taiwan. For its part, Beijing criticizes any U.S. engagement with Taiwan as “interference” in what it calls its internal affairs.
A split opposition
The DPP and its candidate, Vice President Lai Ching-te, should be facing a tough election next year. The party performed poorly in local elections last November, following criticism of its domestic policies including its handling of COVID-19.
Yet if Gou becomes a candidate, he could end up helping the DPP. If Gou succeeds in becoming an official candidate, it "will split the opposition, which would have three major non-DPP candidates," says Yip says. Recent polling puts the DPP in first place, ahead of both the Taiwan People’s Party’s Ko Wen-je and the Kuomintang’s Hou Yu-ih.
During his campaign announcement, Gou called for the three opposition candidates to unite behind a single campaign to unseat the DPP. “The most important question is whether the opposition really wants to win. If we do, we must unite,” he said on Monday.
"I'm not sure [Beijing] would be happy to see the opposition be fractured further which would help the DPP," Yip says.
Foxconn’s large presence in mainland China has led to worries that Beijing could threaten the company to influence Gou’s decisions.
The company did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment, yet noted in a statement to Bloomberg that “Gou already handed over the baton four years ago and no longer participates in the daily management of the company.”
In his announcement, Foxconn’s founder suggested that Beijing wouldn’t threaten the company, as it would dissuade foreign investors from putting their money into China.
But Gou said he was willing to take the hit from China. “If the Chinese Communist regime threatens to confiscate the company’s property in China, I will say, ‘Yes! Please do it!’,” he said. “I can sacrifice my personal wealth in exchange for peace for Taiwan."
