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Here is an article that quotes Tim Cook on why Apple produces the iPhone in China: https://www.inc.com/glenn-leibowitz/apple-ceo-tim-cook-this-is-number-1-reaso

Here is an article that quotes Tim Cook on why Apple produces the iPhone in China: https://www.inc.com/glenn-leibowitz/apple-ceo-tim-cook-this-is-number-1-reason-we-make-iphones-in-china-its-not-what-you-think.html https://www.inc.com/glenn-leibowitz/apple-ceo-tim-cook-this-... > The products we do require really advanced tooling, and the precision that you have to have, the tooling and working with the materials that we do are state of the art. And the tooling skill is very deep here. In the U.S., you could have a meeting of tooling engineers and I'm not sure we could fill the room. In China, you could fill multiple football fields. Low-margin things used to be farmed out overseas due to cost. Now things are produced overseas because we lack the expertise locally.

iancmceachern 4y ago
That's not the correct interpretation of his quote. Tooling engineering is a commodity thing, not a tech leadership thing. Apple products are designed in the US, because the same problem, you couldn't find 1000 engineers able to design an iPhone all in one place anywhere else. Yes, the Tooling engineers are in the lower cost to manufacture countries we export the manufacturing to, but the designers of the product are in the US, bay area specifically. Often tunes tooling engineers assemble production lines, molding stations, etc. From components and tools designed and built in the US and Europe. I.e a tooling engineer will design an automated work cell with a robot arm and an injection molding machine. The robot and injection molding machine are designed and built by a us, Japanese or European company, and the rest is sourced locally and then assembled together.