According to the Wisconsin State Journal, despite the fact that Foxconn’s Eau Claire and Green Bay properties are for sale, the seven-story building it owns in downtown Madison remains off the market; however, two floors of the building at 1 W. Main St. owned by a Foxconn-linked business have been up for lease for two years.
A Foxconn spokesperson furthermore would not say whether or not the company has ever occupied the building it purchased from BMO Harris Bank in 2019 for $9.5 million. The building was among many planned for conversion to “innovation centers” across the state, but there has been no sign that the Capitol Square facility is on track to become a company hub. No labeling in the building lobby indicates a Foxconn presence; BMO divisions are listed on the directory for floors one through four and seven; and nothing is listed for floors five and six, the two up for lease.
Foxconn had intended to invest $100 million in engineering and innovation research at UW–Madison to help fund a new building for the College of Engineering if the university raised the same amount. The university said it had received $700,000 roughly a year later — less than 1% of the original commitment.
Additionally, Wisconsin promised Foxconn nearly $4 billion in state and local tax incentives if the company invested $10 billion and created 13,000 jobs over 15 years, constructing a 20-million-square-foot campus along a highway around halfway between Milwaukee and Chicago; however, those plans never materialized. The Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. replaced the original incentive package with one that provides $80 million if the company hires 1,454 workers and invests $672 million by 2026.
