TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Foxconn Technology Group opened its software research and development center in Kaohsiung City on Wednesday (Dec. 6).

The site is housed inside Warehouse No.7 at the city’s well-known Pier-2 Art Center, per CNA. The project resulted from an investment memorandum signed on April 9 between the world’s largest contract electronics maker and the city.

In his speech at the launch, Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) said Foxconn has already built links with Kaohsiung through electric buses, smart cities, and smart manufacturing. He welcomed the company's investment in applied software development.

Foxconn Chair Young Liu (劉揚偉) said the new center will work with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab, academics, officials, and business people to make Kaohsiung a center of software development. The areas Foxconn wanted to focus on were the same as Chen mentioned, such as EVs, smart cities, and smart manufacturing.

An estimated 3,000 people have sent in resumes for the project, which will recruit more than 100 staff in the first phase. Adding the MIT Media Lab research project, Kaohsiung will turn into an even more exemplary model of a smart city, officials said.