Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) — which is known as Foxconn Technology Group (富智康) outside Taiwan — is considering tripling its US investment budget to US$30 billion, US President Donald Trump said while outlining “off-record” remarks made by company chairman chairman Terry Gou (郭台銘), founder of Apple Inc’s biggest manufacturing partner.

Hon Hai, the main assembler of the iPhone, last week unveiled plans to build a US$10 billion factory in Wisconsin, hiring as many as 13,000 people for a project Trump touted as a victory for his “America first” effort to brings jobs back to the US.

That was just the beginning, the president told small-business leaders at a gathering at the White House on Tuesday.

“They’re going to spend US$10 billion, but he is one of the great businessmen of our time and I think the number is going to be US$30 billion,” Trump said.

“He told me off the record he thinks he may go US$30 billion. Think of this. He may go US$30 billion investment, but he told me that off the record so I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone,” he said to laughs from the audience.

It is unclear whether Trump was referring to Gou’s plans for the factory, for the US in general, or if it encompassed investments in other types of manufacturing.

Trump last month told the Wall Street Journal that Apple chief executive officer Tim Cook had promised to build three “big” plants in the US, also without any details.

“Our investment in Wisconsin will be the first of a series of facilities we will be building in several states as part of a robust electronics ecosystem we will be creating in the United States,” Foxconn said in an e-mailed statement. “We have not yet announced our investment plans for other sites. We will provide an update as soon as we have finalized those plans.”

Gou has of late been talking about plans to invest billions around the world, including US$5 billion in India, according to Livemint.

Gou in June said that Hon Hai’s US investment might eventually exceed US$10 billion.