55 ms·

There was a Bloomberg article saying that 98% of Apple production is in China, and it would take 8 years to move 10% of it to other countries[1]. Having the la

• yrgulation 4y ago
  • miketery 4y ago
    Russia’s ally is a stretch. It wouldn’t go to war against the west with Russia. Russia is a resource rich nation, and India needs resource. That’s it. The cheap military hardware helps too.
    • yrgulation 4y ago
      • blue_light_man 4y ago
        Does India imports more gas from Russia than EU?
      • Ekaros 4y ago
        So only financing wars against Middle-Eastern countries is fine?
        • yrgulation 4y ago
          I wasnt aware india is doing that but that should also stop.
          • srvmshr 4y ago
            I don't think India wages proxy wars in Middle east. They are geographically separate by at least a thousand miles.
      • bboygravity 4y ago
        The EU was also financing a war against a European country until about a month ago. At the tune of around 400 million EUR a week (correct me if wrong) in gas it purchased from Russia. With Germany being by far the biggest buyer. What's your point?
        • yrgulation 4y ago
          Germany was under a lot of pressure to end its reliance on russian gas and got a lot of flack for having allowed such high dependency. Its also a supplier of weapons and financial aid as well as a member of nato. As you can see even between allies there is a lot of critique. I suppose the question is, what is _your_ point?
          • motoxpro 4y ago
            I think the point is that's a little bit more complicated than you make it out to be. The USA is also "supporting the war effort" by buying fertilizer, etc from them.
            • yrgulation 4y ago
              Thats just whataboutism. Also the us of a is pretty much leading the effort for ukraine’s independence along with the uk.
              • srvmshr 4y ago
                If it is just whataboutism, then why bother. India is a major US military equipment importer today by slowly pivoting from USSR tech & also a significant business partner to the US. Many multiples higher than its trade with Russia. Thats real $. We could similarly argue India is supporting the US efforts by supporting its revenue.
              • FpUser 4y ago
                [flagged]
          • 4y ago
      • srvmshr 4y ago
        That's a bit uncharitable view considering Russia was getting $1B+ from EU block for gas via Nord Stream 1 every single week until very recently. Indian imports pale in that comparison, being a tiny fraction of that amount. If you're gonna point fingers at least lets do it with the facts being straight. Truthfully, diplomatic relationship isn't a black & white, zero-sum kind of game. The fact that US policies change so erratically gives a lot of countries low confidence from going all-in. The stake is population of 1.4B & a mostly modest per capita income. When you got mouths to feed, war in a distant land makes less sense. Edit: typo
      • mpweiher 4y ago
        You know which Russian gas pipeline is still in operation? The one that goes through Ukraine. These things are a tad more complicated.
  • anaganisk 4y ago
    Apple should move from US? As if US doesn’t countries like Dubai, and Israel which promote active killing of innocent journalists. Has many of its states controlling womens rights? Bailouts and supports companies like Exonn or BP that caused severe disasters?
  • melling 4y ago
    There’s always south of the US border. Making Central America rich solves the immigration issue that has caused much political divisiveness. Of course many Americans will likely head south for a better deal: https://nypost.com/2022/07/28/mexico-city-residents-angered-by-influx-of-americans-speaking-english-gentrifying-area-report/amp/ https://nypost.com/2022/07/28/mexico-city-residents-angered-...
    • yrgulation 4y ago
      That and ukraine once the war is over and simply automating more and bringing manufacturing back in the west and western allied countries.
      • croes 4y ago
        So more expensive products and less jobs because of automation. Next economic crisis here we come.
        • Jalad 4y ago
          This seems like a luddite's argument. Automation tends to make things less expensive, and automation hasn't lead to economic crisis' in the past That's like saying computers are going to destroy a lot of jobs and cause an economic crisis, when in reality the opposite happened
          • croes 4y ago
            So why was it necessary to shift production to China? Automation tended to kill blue collar jobs, and if you don't have job even cheap is expensive. The next wave of automation will kill the higher value jobs too.
            • adventured 4y ago
              > So why was it necessary to shift production to China? It wasn't necessary. You're conflating necessary with desirable. The gap between the two is an increased profit margin, which is desirable for most corporations. Further, the CCP is becoming both dramatically more hostile to business in general and more dangerous as a foe to liberal, democratic nations (including Taiwan most prominently), while simultaneously the financial cost of operating in China has continued to climb by the year (which is a trend that is unlikely to significantly reverse). The China discount for offshoring isn't nearly what it was 15-20 years ago. The disaster that Russia is causing in Europe is a small hint of what China might cause in Asia in the coming decades. Russia's perceived capabilities weren't nearly what the West thought they were; China's military capabilities are more likely to exceed our expectations (in recent history China has more commonly followed the path of hide your strength and bide your time, as opposed to Russia's vacuous boasting), and it's backed up by a gigantic economy with manufacturing that Russia could only dream of.
  • blue_light_man 4y ago
    1. India is not alligned to any country. India cares about what it's best interest for its own people. If that means buying oil from Russia so be it. 2. Article 46 of Indian constitution -> "The State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people, and, in particular, of the Scheduled Castes and the Sche- duled Tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation." 3. The constitution itself of India was written by Ambedkar who himself is a dalit.
    • ram4jesus 4y ago
      I applaud the Indian state. One of the worst things about the Ukraine-Russian Conflict is being made to pick a side. Kudos to India for masterfully navigating both sides.
      • croes 4y ago
        By buying russian oil and indirectly supporting Russia.
        • renewiltord 4y ago
          Well, it's not indirect. It's quite direct. India has fossil fuel deals with Russia and gets most of its weapons from Russia. America armed wars against India in the past and continues to be the largest source of military aid for India's regional enemy Pakistan. Indian-American relations have become quite good in recent times but geopolitics isn't a schoolyard my side v your side thing. You just manage the amount to which people will align with one or the other on a specific issue.
        • nerdawson 4y ago
          Keep in mind that the European gas crisis is because Russia are restricting supply, not because European countries aren't prepared to buy it. Are India behaving any differently to European countries in trying to secure energy?
          • 4y ago
  • MisterSandman 4y ago
    India is more of an ally to the US than Russia. The prime minister openly asked for the war to stop, which is hardly a show of support. I don't see how you can complain about environmental impact when the average Apple user in the US probabaly has an order of magnitude higher impact on the environment than the average Indian.
  • hionnode 4y ago
    • pb7 4y ago
      Calling out societal problems is not racism. Indians calling out police violence in the US wouldn't be racism either.
      • yrgulation 4y ago
        Thank you. I have precisely zero negative feelings towards indians. Incidentally in a previous comment i criticised what i perceive as wests’ declining freedoms. We should he allowed to discuss such topics without being slandered as racist.
      • hionnode 4y ago
        Calling out societal problems is not racism, but using that pretext to undermine a whole country when you don't even have a tiny bit of idea on what the ground situation is, it's definitely racist.
    • yrgulation 4y ago
      It would have been racist if i said anything about indians. But i appreciate the attempt at projecting racism on me instead of focusing on india’s racism towards the lower castes. I wouldnt in good faith and conscience buy a product made by exploiting those people. Countries can be criticised, nothing racist in that.
      • hionnode 4y ago
        • pb7 4y ago
          That's the whole point, we're not okay consuming products made by these types of countries, that's why there is an effort to move production elsewhere. This thread is discussing why the alternative may be better but not good overall.
  • malshe 4y ago
    > most important their treatment of the dalit and lower castes. Dalit are people from lower caste. Also, Indians have been actively engaged in removing the caste-based discrimination for decades now. It will take time. Do you know that at least 50% of all the jobs in the government sector are reserved from people in the lower caste? The same applied to college education as well. This percentage may be higher in some Indian states. Show me another country that has taken such drastic steps to correct historical wrongs.
    • all2 4y ago
      The US civil war was a pretty impressive display of desire to right historical wrongs.
      • archeopetrix 4y ago
        Yes, and you can consider steps taken by India to have had equal amount of impact if not more in the betterment of oppressed. It may not have been a Big Bang improvement like with American civil war but instead slowly over a few decades it has worked quite well
        • all2 4y ago
          I'm always in favor of less bloodshed. On that front the UK and India (I think) have done a much better job than the US did.
      • winter_blue 4y ago
        The US Civil War war never achieved its stated aims for black / previously-ensalved people. Even though the North won the US Civil War, because of Andrew Johnson (edit: not Jackson) and the ultra-conservative SCOTUS, the people of the US South were able to put into effect Jim Crow laws, and the South essentially won the war over whether non-white people should be treated as equal citizens – there's a book on this subject: https://www.amazon.ca/How-South-Won-Civil-War/dp/0190900903 https://www.amazon.ca/How-South-Won-Civil-War/dp/0190900903
  • kube-system 4y ago
    India is also a US ally: https://www.state.gov/u-s-security-cooperation-with-india/ https://www.state.gov/u-s-security-cooperation-with-india/
  • desi_ninja 4y ago
    holy crap dude. read a book or something about India. India has class related problems because of economic disparity and caste (in ALL religions) does play a role but not central to it. It is akin to racism problem in USA, outlawed but will take some time to fully go away. Do not confuse it with dalit oppression. Dalits are as ministers in democratic process, film stars, athletes, in military and top institutes. What are your news sources about India ? I am worried you are being misled by agenda based reporting. Block NYT and WaPo posting on India right away for a better understanding of the country.
  • Georgelemental 4y ago
    India is not Russia's ally, it is also not Russia's foe. They are aligned with each other on some issues (like Pakistan), disagree on other things, like the war in Ukraine.
  • avl999 4y ago
    My reading of the situation is that India is not necessarily pro-Russia, instead its position on Russia vs the West and Russia vs Ukraine is to quote Trump "very fine people on both sides" which may be problematic in of itself but is less red-flaggy than "pro-Russia".
  • lazyninja987 4y ago
  • JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > India is russia’a ally India’s geopolitical focus was Pakistan. In that, Russia was a good ally. As that shifts towards Beijing, Moscow becomes one of the worst possible defence partners.
    • deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • state_less 4y ago
    > India is russia’a ally and we shouldn't depend on it either. This statement lacks nuance regarding the dynamics of the region. India has to negotiate with China, Pakistan, Russia, EU, US and others. India tries to balance the situation as best they know how, and each party doesn’t always get everything they want. Recently India had China right on their doorstep/border and I expect it put a bit of strain on the India-Russia relations due to the ties between Russia and China. It looks like that situation has cooled down some, which is positive. I’d prefer the US engage with India in a way that strengthens our shared values and our trading interests.
  • rohan_shah 4y ago
    This statement makes no sense. You're putting out political opinions on the lives of people without any idea of the reality. The caste system was a part of India but every Government since independence has made attempts and continues to make everything possible to make the lives of the historically lower castes better off. Not to mention India was forced to become a USSR ally because the USA had sent their aircraft carrier in a India Pakistan war to support the Pakistan side. And then the USSR sent their aircraft carrier in India's defence.
  • _8j50 4y ago
    India does business with Russia that does not mean they are allied. Allied means India would be participating in the Ukraine conflict like Bulgaria. But I get what you mean, they have similar relationships with China and the US as well, they are a sovreim nation that do what they think is best for their people.
• alphabetting 4y ago
  Definitely not ideal. Moving away from China is good but I wonder how much of this is PR. It wouldn't make sense to move given they spent $275B building up Chinese manufacturing. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/12/report-apple-ceo-tim-cook-engineered-a-secret-275-billion-deal-with-china/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/12/report-apple-ceo-tim...
  • bobthepanda 4y ago
    I think more realistically zero COVID and the resulting supply chain shortages due to port and factory lockdowns are a bigger concern. Making iPhones in China is no good if you can’t get them out to shelves in time.
  • bsder 4y ago
    > Moving away from China is good but I wonder how much of this is PR. Some of it is PR, but the reality is that wages have been rising in China and other countries like India are cheaper. And, Apple spent $275B as part of a shakedown to avoid Chinese regulations. If Apple didn't start moving their business after that, the people running it are fools. I suspect Apple would be much further along on that if Covid hadn't hit in the middle of this.
  • r00fus 4y ago
    That's a fallacy in thinking (sunk costs fallacy). If there's strategic risk in single-sourcing you need to diversify.
• hahamrfunnyguy 4y ago
  Is Apple really that important though? Sure, consumers love their Apple products but there are certainly plenty of alternatives for just about everything they make. If the US lost China as a trade partner, the entire consumer electronics industry would be in big trouble.
  • arberx 4y ago
    > Is Apple really that important though? Yes, this is not even arguable. A national security concern as well.
    • svnpenn 4y ago
      It is arguable. I would be fine if Apple crashed and burned. I don't use any Apple products. My company does, but Apple folded, I'm sure we would just move to Android or something. Apple is the only company I have ever seen, that doesn't give business discounts. We pay the same as any Joe off the street. Even Microsoft doesn't do that. Fuck Apple.
      • pb7 4y ago
        It sounds like you have a personal beef with Apple because you don't get special treatment. This has nothing to do with its importance to the US, which is extremely high.
      • gjsman-1000 4y ago
        You seem to forget that literally almost every Android phone is also made in China and would be immediately hit with the same sanctions. Every Android phone also has parts made in Taiwan, just like the iPhone, an area that would almost certainly be blockaded in the event of a conflict. As for your complaints about business discounts... I see it as a win for the consumer that they don't have to be a "business" to artificially pay less. Fuck that.
        • newaccount2021 4y ago
          huh? Samsung is the Android market...made in Vietnam afaik they exited China manufacturing completely in 2019
• PaywallBuster 4y ago
  scary At the same time, Apple is big enough it could possibly "disrupt" supply chains and suddenly a new manufacturing center somewhere else and bring the house with it?
  • stingraycharles 4y ago
    Yes but no matter how much money / production capacity you want to bring, at some point it still takes physical time to build all the factories and set up the whole ecosystem. 5 - 10 years sounds about right.
    • PaywallBuster 4y ago
      hopefully a lot more than 10% > and it would take 8 years to move 10% of it to other countries
• jquery 4y ago
  >8 years to move 10% of it I think this timeline is heavily dependent on how motivated Apple is...
• alexfromapex 4y ago
  I totally get that but what I don't understand is why they'd shift it to India instead of the USA or somewhere closer. This might create the same problem a few years from now.
  • valarauko 4y ago
    Apple suppliers already have infrastructure in place to assemble iPhones in India (and Brazil?) so it makes sense to boost that capacity. Lower hanging fruit.
  • themagician 4y ago
    At some level, slave labor or literally wage slavery is necessary to make the things most of us enjoy. It’s not just the low pay that’s the issue though. Big companies need to be able to dump production waste somewhere otherwise costs increase. An Apple product that was truly, 100% made in the USA from parts that are also 100% made in the USA would be extremely expensive. The Librem 5 USA is about as close as you can get at $2000 for a phone with pretty anemic specs; and many individual parts and raw materials still come from abroad.
    • millimeterman 4y ago
      It's not like Apple can compel anyone to work for them - they must offer competitive pay to attract workers. By definition, the people in India taking jobs at Apple are doing so because it's the best option available to them. The reality is that foreign industry factory jobs are generally considered quite desirable and high-paying in these countries. This "slave labor" is, in fact, one of the primary mechanisms by which living standards in developing countries are elevated over time. You may (understandably) feel bad about enjoying a product made by someone getting nominally paid orders of magnitude less than you. But naively arguing that Apple should be mandated to pay more (or even be forced to produce in the US) does the opposite of help the people you claim to be worried about.
      • themagician 4y ago
        I don't feel bad at all. I'm just saying, that's the way it is. I'm not arguing for Apple to be paying more. What I am calling "slavery" for lack of a better word, in whatever form it may take, is a key component of capitalism. I'm just saying that no one really wants something made 100% in the USA because very few people could afford it. You are 100% right in that this is the primary mechanism for increasing the standard of living around the world. It's worked so well in fact that the wages in China are not nearly as low as they once were. I would say that low wages alone are no longer the primary benefit of having something made in China. It's much more the scale and loose environmental regulations that are valuable now. There are quite a few things that you use every day which are almost exclusively made in China or India or similar. I think people in general do not realize just how much we rely on China and Chinese manufacturing, and how beneficial it is for everyone to have things made abroad. People focus on the higher end factory items like iPhone assembly but don't often think about all the sub-components. Base materials like adhesive, spray on preservatives, plastic containers, labels, etc. are almost all made in China or somewhere with loose environmental regulations. There are so many items that go into day-to-day items that are either made in China or made from products imported from China. If it's made from plastic or for plastic, and it's made at scale, there is a really good chance it's made in China.
• mmaunder 4y ago
  And one of the largest social applications in the US. Hearts and minds.
• iepathos 4y ago
  Or it's a very good thing for keeping tensions under control with both countries benefiting drastically from keeping the relationship functional.
  • jjtheblunt 4y ago
  • themitigating 4y ago
    Then why didn't that work with russia, they have ruined their economy for a war
    • ketzo 4y ago
      That is a very complicated question, but in short: Russia’s economy is supported by oil. Oil is pretty much the one thing that they’ve still been consistently able to export. China’s economy is based on exporting lots and lots and lots of manufactured goods. Many of them are essential, but many of them could be banned tomorrow.
      • lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
        The point being that Russia would be more desperate due to fewer options? Not trying to argue, just curious.
        • ketzo 4y ago
          The opposite, actually — people NEED Russia’s oil. They don’t have the option to stop buying it without a lot of pain. So Russia’s biggest money-fountain has stayed on despite sanctions. Meanwhile, China exports a lot of things that people don’t need. You can turn those off quicker. Again — huge oversimplifications. But I think reasonably solid mental model.
          • tablespoon 4y ago
• angry_cactus 4y ago
  The article said > But Bloomberg Intelligence estimates it would take about eight years to move just 10% of Apple’s production capacity out of China, where roughly 98% of the company’s iPhones have been made. 98% of the iPhones that have been made already, not 98% of iPhones currently being made. So the percentage is probably somewhat lower as of present.
• barrkel 4y ago
  If it takes 8 years to move 10%, does that mean it takes 16 years to move 20%? Would it take 80 years to move 100%? Doesn't really make sense, does it, given that it didn't take 80 years to ramp up originally. Apple couldn't move out of China overnight, but it could move faster or slower, depending on how much of an impact to the bottom line it can take.
  • dmix 4y ago
    There's so many developing countries that could make tons of $$ by adopting manufacturing. All of Africa, South East Asia (vietnam et al are rising quickly), maybe parts of South America and Eastern Europe, and even Central Asia. If I was the leader in any of those regions I'd be figuring out how to become #2 or #3 to Chin and India ASAP. But I guess they all have their own local problems to excuse away why they don't.
    • argsv 4y ago
      You’re assuming that leaders of these countries are largely benevolent. They’re optimizing for their own interests. Bringing manufacturing into these countries will only introduce new competitors to their rule over time. Think of Saudi for instance, they can bring manufacturing and they import workforce if necessary from India , Africa, Asia and Europe but they won’t. They’re happy with the oil sector because that’s easy to control.
      • esperent 4y ago
        The leaders of Vietnam are - well, it's complicated and there's a lot of corruption and weird cultural stuff to overcome. I don't mean Vietnamese cultural stuff, I mean the culture of the Vietnamese government. But somewhere behind that I do believe they have a vision for the country. I have lived here for 5 years now and I see a country going though a rapid transition from extreme poverty (just 20-30 years ago) to now, in places like Da Nang, Quy Nhon, Dalat, parts of HCMC and Hanoi, being fairly developed and rapidly becoming more so. Apparently they have lifted a million people per year out of extreme poverty for the last 30 years and there's a rapidly growing middle class too. Of course, from those areas, you can just drive 50km (or even just down a side street in a big city) and be in an area that seems like it hasn't been touched by development, although you can still probably get a 200mb internet connection in these places. And there are entire provinces that are still very poor. It's a big and complicated country on a winding but largely positive trajectory. Don't dismiss the leaders here in the same breathe as the Saudis. They have their own highly complex and developed culture, with both good and bad sides, and you need to take the time to understand it before you can comment on it. If I was in industry, I would bet on this country as being a good place for manufacturing. Right now, for low-medium tech stuff. But in ten or twenty years I predict this country will be a high tech manufacturing hub.
• hammock 4y ago
  So 100 years to move all of it..
• bohadi 4y ago
  Economic interdependence is studied in the theory of International Relations. As other commenters have pointed out, interdependence is variously seen as preventing or leading to conflict. The former in the Liberalist school, when two countries both see war as too costly to their mutual interests. The latter in the Realist school, when interdependence is weaponized as a point of control or viewed as vulnerability. The trade expectations model (Copeland) argues that high existing interdependence but declining expectations leads to conflict, while a statusquo that is relatively independent but with increasing expectations can be peace-inducing. I admit the expectations model is somewhat circular reasoning, cyclical really. Though it is statistically explanative of historical conflicts in the 19th and 20th century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_interdependence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_interdependence https://www.jstor.org/stable/2539041 https://www.jstor.org/stable/2539041
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
• actually_a_dog 4y ago
  And here I thought globalized supply chains were "efficient" or something.
• vbezhenar 4y ago
  Is Apple important? They produces nice gadgets but those don’t seem to power anything truly important and could be replaced easily.
  • squidofbits 4y ago
    Indeed Apple is a frivolous enterprise. MacBooks and iPhones aren’t used for anything important.
    • fomine3 4y ago
      That's why closed platform is bad. That's why closed platform is bad. It's dead if hardware is no longer supplied.
  • herbst 4y ago
    I think the reason they are worried is because Apples luxury gadgets make like 7% of the security of their pension Fonds. Meaning the whole economy could collapse of just this one gadget company can't deliver to the world market anymore. It's a very Weird and dystopian situation imo.
• faeriechangling 4y ago
  It’s a great thing, it prevents war between two nuclear armed nations.
• mikeryan 4y ago
  China also has a population that’s rapidly aging and shrinking. Its ability to supply inexpensive labor is likely to decline over the next 10-20 years. Considering the time frames involved Apple having a 10-15 year plan to geographically distribute its production makes sense for a lot of reasons.
  • QuarterReptile 4y ago
    Rapidly aging, and recently shrinking, at an accelerating rate. That distinction is the difference between a managed concern and a lot of geopolitical risk in the next ten years.
• princevegeta89 4y ago
  Interesting it takes so long for a low 10% of it to move to other countries. This could mostly be a matter of politics though.
• Waterluvian 4y ago
  It’s a luxury products company, which is least concern. In fact it’s probably a good way to keep the peace.
• nimbius 4y ago
  this is an unamerican opinion on hn so I don't expect it to be popular but I would imagine this is a proactive effort by Apple in light of recent and persistent American brinkmanship over China in general. first huawei, then trump, then tiktok, now Taiwan. apple can explain away suicide nets and child labor, but geopolitical turmoil is risk to the shareholder.
• philliphaydon 4y ago
  For iPhones I don’t quite understand the article. The only thing “made” in China is the battery. The phone is only assembled in China. But all the components are made outside of Chinas. Assembly is much easier to move than manufacturing the components.
  • shalmanese 4y ago
    Apple has a public supplier list: https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Supplier-List.pdf https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple-Supp... The majority of suppliers on that list are from Mainland China.
    • philliphaydon 4y ago
      Ok, but that doesn't change what I said? Memory is from Japan / Korea. Display from Samsung. CPU from Taiwan. FaceID from the US. Many of the chips are all made in the US. The only thing that China does is final assembly, by a Taiwanese company.
• Spooky23 4y ago
  This is why the constant drumbeat of Sinophobia is mostly bread and circus for the masses. Bilateral relations with China are probably the most important relationship for each country. We’re not going to war.
  • buscoquadnary 4y ago
    People said the same thing about the UK and Germany at the beginning of 1914. That led to tens of thousands of English boys drowning in mud over of the course of days at Paschendale and millions of young German men slaughtered in a line running from the Alps to the coast.
• onetokeoverthe 4y ago
• onetokeoverthe 4y ago
• stereoradonc 4y ago
  The bloomberg article appeared like a planted pitch to discredit the India's success in exports.