Foxconn says there is a need to hire 50,000 people in first quarter after job cut reports

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan's Foxconn, assembler of Apple Inc's iPhones, on Tuesday said it still has a need to hire 50,000 people in the first quarter, amid reports of mass lay-offs across its factories in China.

The world's largest contract manufacturer, formally known as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd, said in a stock exchange filing that changes in employee numbers were part of its usual adjustments based on global strategy and clients' needs.

"The group still has recruiting needs of more than 50,000 in parts of the factories in China in the first quarter of 2019," Foxconn said in Chinese.

Last week, the Nikkei reported that Foxconn had let go around 50,000 contract workers in China since October, months earlier than normal.

The Nikkei report came weeks after Apple cut current-quarter production for new iPhones by 10 percent in the face of slowing demand in China, the world's largest smartphone market.

Chipmaker Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and other tech suppliers have also warned of a tech slowdown going into 2019.

Foxconn, which sources said makes roughly half its revenue from Apple, reported an 8 percent fall in December sales earlier this month.

The company on Tuesday did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.

At Foxconn's campus in Zhengzhou in central China, thousands of temporary contract workers and some regular staffers left of their own accord due to the lack of weekend work, trimmed overtime opportunities, and reduced or cancelled peak-season bonuses, five production line workers there told Reuters in December.

(Reporting by Jess Macy Yu in TAIPEI; Additional reporting by Stella Qiu and Philip Wen in BEIJING and Chyen Yee Lee in SINGAPORE; Editing by Sayantani Ghosh and Christopher Cushing)