President-elect Trump considers potential Apple manufacturing in US a 'real achievement'

Posted:
in AAPL Investors edited November 2016
President-elect Donald Trump's full transcript of his interview with the New York Times has been published, and some details about his conversation with Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook involving U.S. manufacturing have emerged.



Photo: Credit Hiroko Masuike -- The New York Times


"Tim, you know one of the things that will be a real achievement for me is when I get Apple to build a big plant in the United States, or many big plants in the United States," recounted Trump to the New York Times about the recent call with the Apple CEO. "Instead of going to China, and going to Vietnam, and going to the places that you go to, you're making your product right here."

According to Trump, Cook's only response was, "I understand that."

"I think we'll create the incentives for you, and I think you're going to do it," added Trump. "We're going for a very large tax cut for corporations, which you'll be happy about."

In the portion of the conversation related to Cook and Apple, Trump also pointed to his view that a "choking" overly regulatory environment within the federal government is responsible for a poor start-up climate, and hampers expansion.

"I've met so many people. They are more excited about the regulation cut than about the tax cut," said Trump. "And I would've never said that's possible, because the tax cut's going to be substantial."

Trump added that the reaction to regulatory reduction was surprising to him, and "more enthusiastically supported" than large tax cuts.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 133
    wood1208wood1208 Posts: 2,904member
    Mr. Trump, how about pressuring Samsung, LG and most importantly Chinese phone companies like Huawei trying to enter North American market to manufacturer their phones or products here in USA ? If you can't do that than get off Apple's back.
    edited November 2016 caliericthehalfbeeRayz2016lmagooThe_Martini_Catlostkiwiargonautlolliverwatto_cobrahlee1169
  • Reply 2 of 133
    AlexViennaAlexVienna Posts: 1unconfirmed, member
    I don't like what Trump is doing, but in this case I must admit that its not an Apple thing. If he does a tax cut and increases customs duties it will be tougher for Korean and Chinese companies to sell something in the U.S. The problem is, this might have serious long term consequences.
    lostkiwiwilliamlondonlolliver
  • Reply 3 of 133
    The regulations aspect is interesting since Apple seemingly wanted to make Watch a more capable health tracker but ran into issues if it were considered a medical device.
    calijbdragonpalomine
  • Reply 4 of 133
    calicali Posts: 3,494member
     How about Trump stops the sale of all that iknockoffs in the country first.  Take away the rights from the IP thieves who steal from American companies. 

     I'm sure then it will be fair for Apple to return a favor.
    lolliverwatto_cobrapalominejony0
  • Reply 5 of 133
    evilutionevilution Posts: 1,399member
    If you get robots to make the products, the costs shouldn't be much higher. Plus you get less leaks.
    1983schlacktallest skilgtrjbdragonpalominejony0
  • Reply 6 of 133
    Trump is missing the point. It's not possible because there aren't enough people with the necessary skills. One example previously talked about by Cook were tool & die makers, an essential part of any product assembly (where you're making a large number of devices). People just aren't going into this trade in the US simply because most products are made overseas. There's no job market.

    Is Trump going to allow Apple to bring in thousands of foreign workers because there aren't enough in the US? Is he going to create incentives for people in the US to choose these as a career? Will he allow Apple to delay manufacturing until such time that there are enough people in the US trained in the various disciplines required (which would take years)?

    This is not something you can do overnight (if you can at all).
    1983anantksundaramwaverboylostkiwithinkman@chartermi.netlowededwookierandominternetpersonargonautlolliverroundaboutnow
  • Reply 7 of 133
    spice-boyspice-boy Posts: 1,450member
    I know let's meet here one year from today and see how he handles this and a bunch of his other promises. Until then there is not much to say of the subject.
    jasenj1waverboytallest skilwilliamlondonlolliverroundaboutnowjustadcomicsbaconstangjony0
  • Reply 8 of 133
    evilution said:
    If you get robots to make the products, the costs shouldn't be much higher. Plus you get less leaks.
    Steven Job's ultimate vision, dating back to his time with NeXT, was to have machines building machines, so I bet Apple has been investing heavily into supply chain automation (logistics automation). The Liam is probably one of the manifestation of this.
    edited November 2016 tallest skilargonautjustadcomicsjbdragonjony0cornchip
  • Reply 9 of 133
    Great news. Where to put the first plant? Gary, Indiana could use a little love, but I've always loved the sound of Chattanooga. 
    cornchip
  • Reply 10 of 133
    Trump is missing the point. It's not possible because there aren't enough people with the necessary skills. One example previously talked about by Cook were tool & die makers, an essential part of any product assembly (where you're making a large number of devices). People just aren't going into this trade in the US simply because most products are made overseas. There's no job market.

    Is Trump going to allow Apple to bring in thousands of foreign workers because there aren't enough in the US? Is he going to create incentives for people in the US to choose these as a career? Will he allow Apple to delay manufacturing until such time that there are enough people in the US trained in the various disciplines required (which would take years)?

    This is not something you can do overnight (if you can at all).
    They certainly are "enough people with the necessary skills". What isn't available is the amount of those people at a low enough price that would seem acceptable to most companies when the same task can be accomplished for a lower price elsewhere.
    edited November 2016 boopthesnootlmagoolostkiwityler82jbdragon
  • Reply 11 of 133
    Rayz2016Rayz2016 Posts: 6,957member
    I have high hopes for Trump. I voted for him because I truly believe he can bring changes that are need here stateside. I also think good advisers will temper his extreme talk. He is just candid like I am. Doesn't mean he is bad. Just has to choose his words differently depending on who he is addressing. 
    Right.

    So during a conversation about women during whicy he said, "You can do anything. Grab them by the p###y," which words should he have chosen?

    When he went past that 14-year-old girl and said to an adviser that he would be dating her in ten years, would it have been better if he said he'd be dating her in twelve years?
    waverboyanantksundaramlostkiwiargonautwilliamlondonlolliverwatto_cobrasmiffy31hlee1169justadcomics
  • Reply 12 of 133
    Rayz2016 said:
    I have high hopes for Trump. I voted for him because I truly believe he can bring changes that are need here stateside. I also think good advisers will temper his extreme talk. He is just candid like I am. Doesn't mean he is bad. Just has to choose his words differently depending on who he is addressing. 
    Right.

    So during a conversation about women during whicy he said, "You can do anything. Grab them by the p###y," which words should he have chosen?

    When he went past that 14-year-old girl and said to an adviser that he would be dating her in ten years, would it have been better if he said he'd be dating her in twelve years?
    Stop being a pussy. I don't see anything wrong with those comments.
    tallest skilapple ][gtrjbdragon
  • Reply 13 of 133
    flaneurflaneur Posts: 4,526member
    The ecosystem of electronics manufacturing has been building in Asia for 50'years, since Sony started making transistor radios. Americans were too slow to build solid state televisions, VCRs, all the peripheral elements around the chips in computers.

    About the only things that America can supply to Apple are some of the chips and the glass. Even the CNC-milled aluminum would be far more costly, slow and inflexible, because Asians have been engineering and revising tiny components from aluminum from back in the days of VCRs and video camcorders.

    There simply is no infrastructure here, Mein Führer. And iit'll be a waste of money to try to build it now. Like trying to build Boeing airliners in Mexico — we didn't throw that industry away, see?

    Americans have to develop what they know best — invention, mental software, based on the stew of stimulation that comes from a mix of people free to think as they like and act on that. Plus loose capital, and a culture of investing in the future.


    edited November 2016 anantksundaramlolliverhlee1169justadcomicsbaconstangsinophiliapalomine
  • Reply 14 of 133
    Trump is barking up the wrong tree. It's not in Tim Cook's hands where iPhones are made. People like to think Apple closed down its American factories and moved them to China to save money. That's not what happened. Apple closed down every single one of its factories in the entire world. Apple doesn't want to be in manufacturing. Apple designs all the components for its devices. It then pays component manufacturers to make them according to Apple's specifications. Those component manufacturers are located all over the world. Some of them are even in the USA.

    Bottom line is that Apple cannot "move manufacturing back to the USA" because it doesn't own any manufacturing plants to begin with. 
    jvmbjasenj1mike egglestonargonautlolliverwatto_cobrasmiffy31hlee1169kudujustadcomics
  • Reply 15 of 133
    vvswarup said:
    Trump is barking up the wrong tree. It's not in Tim Cook's hands where iPhones are made. People like to think Apple closed down its American factories and moved them to China to save money. That's not what happened. Apple closed down every single one of its factories in the entire world. Apple doesn't want to be in manufacturing. Apple designs all the components for its devices. It then pays component manufacturers to make them according to Apple's specifications. Those component manufacturers are located all over the world. Some of them are even in the USA.

    Bottom line is that Apple cannot "move manufacturing back to the USA" because it doesn't own any manufacturing plants to begin with. 
    But Apple does want to manufacture it's own products if it reaches cost parity with outsourcing it to others.
  • Reply 16 of 133
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,239member
    Trump is missing the point. It's not possible because there aren't enough people with the necessary skills. One example previously talked about by Cook were tool & die makers, an essential part of any product assembly (where you're making a large number of devices). People just aren't going into this trade in the US simply because most products are made overseas. There's no job market.

    Is Trump going to allow Apple to bring in thousands of foreign workers because there aren't enough in the US? Is he going to create incentives for people in the US to choose these as a career? Will he allow Apple to delay manufacturing until such time that there are enough people in the US trained in the various disciplines required (which would take years)?

    This is not something you can do overnight (if you can at all).
    They certainly are "enough people with the necessary skills". What isn't available is the amount of those people at a low enough price that would seem acceptable to most companies when the same task can be accomplished for a lower price elsewhere.
    No there aren't. The manufacturing process for electronic devices doesn't take a college graduate, it takes someone willing to stand/sit on an assembly line and do menial tasks. All the people in Detroit know about this type of work but they worked on larger things. Mobile devices are small and take people who are able to deal with small things. It also takes a lot of people, like 50K or more, who can come and do the work for a fixed period of time before moving to another electronics assembly firm. The US has too many MBAs and other "workers" who could never do these jobs. It's just like all the gardeners and field workers Trump wants to send back across the border. Americans choose not to do this type of work, especially without at least minimum wage and a health and retirement plan. 

    The worst thing about Trump's statement is this one, "Tim, you know one of the things that will be a real achievement for me is when I get Apple to build a big plant in the United States, or many big plants in the United States," which shows he really doesn't care about supporting the country only getting his "star" on Pennsylvania Ave. The President is supposed to be concerned about the people of the US not themselves. All his other hyperbole shows he's simply going to try and do whatever he can to promote big business, including his own, at the expense of all the citizens, including all those who voted for him. 
    jvmbanantksundaramtallest skillostkiwirandominternetpersonargonautmacguiroundaboutnowwatto_cobrasmiffy31
  • Reply 17 of 133
    But if he succeeds in brining manufacturing back but companies use mostly robots and automation to be competitive globally, what has Trump really achieved jobs wise? Don't get me wrong, I think we should have manufacturing capabilities built up here, even if automated, it's good for economics and national security, but does it directly help with jobs as much as Trump thinks?
    mr olostkiwibaconstang
  • Reply 18 of 133
    I don't see how the USA can compete with cultures where workers are housed in dorms, eat in company cafeterias, don't own cars, etc. Where many of the employees' other choices include subsistence farming in huts. And I don't know what the health care is like in China, the Philippines, Taiwan, etc. but I'm going to guess it is cheaper for companies than whatever we have in the USA. And then there's environmental regulations, workplace safety, and many other regulatory burdens.

    I'm not saying it can't be profitable to manufacture in the USA, but I think it will always be MORE profitable to manufacture in third/second-world countries. Unless we impose large enough tariffs - but that leads to cries of "protectionism", "trade war", etc.
    edited November 2016 anantksundaramjbdragonbaconstang
  • Reply 19 of 133
    I don't like what Trump is doing, but in this case I must admit that its not an Apple thing. If he does a tax cut and increases customs duties it will be tougher for Korean and Chinese companies to sell something in the U.S. The problem is, this might have serious long term consequences.
    China, Korea and many other countries already have protectionist, anti-competitive rules in place which exist to protect their local markets, in addition to the blatant IP theft they allow to sponge off the hard work of other companies.
    tallest skiljbdragon
  • Reply 20 of 133
    This might be completely off point, but doesn't China have 90% of the rare earth materials, which is used in all electronics? I'm sure there are deals made to keep a certain percentage of manufacturing in China in exchange for the material. Maybe start with one or two components made in the US, but the supply chain for manufacturing of iPhones and alike are just not here.
    palomine
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