y2an

It’s hard to know where to start on this rather wrong article. First, there would be no “reshoring” of manufacturing for the iPhone to the US because it was never made here before; it would be bringing iPhone manufacturing to the US for the first time. Second, it is cost infeasible (widely reported just about everywhere) and the tariffs would have to be absurdly high and sustained at that level far into the future for Apple (or any other manufacturer, for that matter) to be able to justify investing in such an expensive project as bringing overpriced manufacturing to the US. This administration has little more than three years to run at which point policies could all change, hardly a stable environment for such enormous business investments; most businesses will just weather the storm. Third, and I really don’t know why the tariff hawks don’t get this, the only way Apple would bring manufacturing on a high volume item like the iPhone to the US is if it was highly automated, eliminating most of the human element, so it would fail to meet any hope the tariff hawks have of providing employment. 

It beats me why AppleInsider would have a point of view about seeing manufacturing in the US. It makes AI an unreliable reporter on the issue. What if every large country or trading bloc followed similar strategies to make sure everything sold was manufactured domestically? If businesses literally had no other choice but to follow these imposed rules they would spend all of their investment on regionalised production rather than R&D on innovative new products - assuming, of course, they didn’t simply want to forgo those other markets because the local manufacturing requirements were too draconian to care to participate. 

Lacking in build quality? I don’t think so, Apple never turns out a shabbily built product.

It advances the state of the art at the low end of the range. It uses an in-house modem which pushes up Apple’s margins and gives more flexibility for dealing with tariffs or discounting. It supports Apple Intelligence, which is crucial to Apple’s claim that their product range is ready for AI. It divorces from still having devices with Lightning connectors in the product mix. Not everyone wants the best camera, just an adequate one. I don’t think the 16e is for me, but I think it is for a lot of people. 11% is not to be sniffed at!

Would you trust this carrier with your personal information? They have access to your location and call history. Call home and get a free visit from ICE…

If anything, Apple has been too timid in introducing some of these obvious features sooner and I wonder if that was because of concern for third-party developers or questions about IP ownership? As for the third parties, however good their products are, have they ever had any leverage to protect themselves against competition from anyone (Apple included)? Perhaps they have always been living on borrowed time. 

“Ordered”? There is no such power.