For years, specialists have warned that manufacturing iPhones in USA I would exorbit the prices of the devices, but the US Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnickhe revealed a conversation he had with Tim Cook About a key change in Apple: robots.
Lutnick said, during an interview he provided to CNBCthat He had a conversation with Apple executive director Tim Cookabout the manufacture of iPhones in the North American country.
“I talked to Tim Cook the other day, he told me: ‘I need to have robotics to make them on a scale and precision that allows me to bring it here. And the day I have them available I will bring it because I do not like to use all this number of people abroad; That is my greatest risk. What happens if in China there is a social strike or discomfort and suddenly I lose your workforce? ‘”The US Secretary of Commerce said.
Donald Trump official stressed that Apple’s CEO wants to manufacture the devices in the American soil. “He [Tim Cook] You will manufacture them here. AND The Americans are going to be the technicians who direct these factories. They will not be the ones who screw. People get my context comments: Americans are going to work in factories like this, with very well paid jobs, ”he said.
In that line, he said about American workers: “They will train these technicians and They will have the new industrial revolution; The IA industrial revolution. This will give them excellent jobs, your children will have these excellent jobs, And we will be the society we met again”.
In the midst of the new tariff policy launched by the Trump Administration for companies that do not manufacture in the country, the possibility of Apple to transfer its production line from China to the USA was speculated. Something that seems impossible, but that the current government wants and about what it continues to insist.
In early April, the White House press Secretary, Caroline Leavitt, He remarked that Apple could relocate the manufacture of the iPhone. “The president believes that we have the labor, workforce and resources to achieve it. Apple has invested USS $ 500 billion in the United States. So, if you did not believe that the US can do it, it probably would not have contributed that large amount,” he said during a press conference.
According to different analysts, the manufacture of iPhones in the United States could lead to the price of exorbitant devices and what is now achieved for around US $ 1000 could cost up to three times more.
The technological specialist Dan IVES, from Wedbush Securities, explained to CNN what replicate in the United States The complex Production ecosystem that Apple It currently has in Asia It would imply huge costs.
But it is not just the production costs, but of the lack of qualified labor. One of the great obstacles is that American workers have no technical skills, nor the specialization in precision engineering that the company needs.
In this regard, Apple’s CEO had already explained that China’s advantage does not lie in low wages. “The amount of precision tools engineers in China is huge. In the United States, a conference room would hardly fill. In China, you would fill out soccer courts,” Cook said in an interview.
