Themed "Treasure your life, love your family, care for each other to build a wonderful future," the event took place at Foxconn facilities across China, the company said, with tens of thousands of employees turning out in costume.

At Foxconn's giant campus in the southern city of Shenzhen, booming music filled a stadium as thousands of workers -- dressed in everything from Spider-Man outfits to the Argentina football strip -- clapped and cheered.

A band played the traditional Chinese pipa, a four-stringed instrument, while yellow-clad acrobats danced and performed balancing tricks. Red banners saying "Care for and love each other" fluttered in the wind.

Employees from other factories across China were beamed in on a giant screen for the event, which followed the suicides of 13 workers this year at Foxconn.

"Foxconn feels it's perhaps time to look back and to learn from the tragedies and to send an important message to their employees that they are not alone, and that the Foxconn family is there to support them and to help them through their challenges," the company said in a statement.

The march aimed to promote "unity among employees of Foxconn and to extend moral support and resources to help employees deal with personal and work challenges," it added.

The suicides at Foxconn highlighted working conditions for about 200 million migrant workers who are helping drive China's stunning economic rise.

The world's largest maker of computer components, Foxconn assembles Apple's iPhone and is a supplier to leading brands such as Dell and Nokia.

It had said about 50,000 of its 900,000 employees were due to take part in Wednesday's rally.

A 26-year-old worker at the event, dressed as a cheerleader with silver pom-poms, said the firm's often-criticised management style was improving.

"The supervisors are more caring now," said the woman, who has worked at Foxconn for three and a half years. "The conditions are better than they were."

Toby Tian, 33, a project manager from Hubei province who has been at Foxconn for nine years, said of the rally: "It's a happy time for the employees.

"When I started, work was work. But people can enjoy the work more now and have a life."

Ten of the 13 deaths took place at Foxconn's Shenzhen facility, which employs an estimated 400,000 workers and is fitted with spotless factories, bakeries, banks, employee apartments, acupuncture clinics and fast-food shops.

The high-profile suicides this year sparked an investigation and prompted Foxconn founder Terry Gou to lead media on a tour of the Shenzhen campus in May.

Labour rights activists blamed the deaths on tough working conditions in Foxconn factories.

But Gou has said that none of the suicides was directly work-related, and that he had been cleared by Chinese authorities of any wrongdoing.

Louis Woo, a special assistant to Gou, told reporters Wednesday that "suicide is a very complex event and there is no single factor as a cause... No matter how hard you try, such things will happen in large organisations."

But he admitted: "We were kind of blinded by our success. We had not changed fast enough to meet the needs of this new generation of workers."

In May, hours before the 11th worker died, Foxconn urged workers to sign contracts promising not to kill themselves -- prompting widespread criticism.

The firm responded by introducing a suicide hotline, hiring Buddhist monks and counsellors to help at-risk employees and pledging to retrain its supervisors.

It gave employees a pay rise of 67 percent, to 2,000 yuan (around 290 US dollars) a month, effective from October 1.

Woo said the company had also installed enough safety nets outside buildings to cover 450 football fields.

"People mocked us but experts said it was the most effective prevention strategy," given the impulsive nature of suicide, he said.

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