Apple does help its suppliers to make a profit -- but the amount of profit that sustains a healthy set of vendors for Apple, at quality levels and corporate pra

Apple does help its suppliers to make a profit -- but the amount of profit that sustains a healthy set of vendors for Apple, at quality levels and corporate practice levels that Apple evaluates as "fair". Now, you may criticize that this holds vendors over a barrel and squeezes them to narrow margins, etc. But at least give Apple credit for having a view to the long run and trying to create a pool of vendors that it can rely on in a sustainable way, and not just some surge capacity for the next quarter only to drop them. Apple thinks longer than that. Their procurement function is quite skilled. And it's not like the vendors would magically have some source of business at better terms than Apple that would be good for them in the long run either. You want suppliers to somehow be raking in great margins in excess of what was "fair"? You want an employer who's more clueless and lets you make lots of extra on the top? A successful supplier to Apple knows what it's capable of and what its costs are, signs on to grow with Apple and become successful, and share in the practices that make a company efficient, skilled, productive. They can choose to join this train. Or not. It's voluntary.