According to Nikkei Asia, Apple will manufacture some of its MacBooks in Vietnam starting in 2023. The company plans to move its production outside China to avoid trade tensions between the Asian country and the US, as well as supply chain disruptions caused by Covid-19 restrictions.
It is reported that in August, Apple was in talks to transfer part of the production of the Apple Watch, MacBook and HomePod to Vietnam. Its partner Foxconn may begin assembling MacBooks in the country as early as May.
Apple makes 20 to 24 million MacBooks annually. According to Nikkei Asia, the Cupertino company has been planning to move production to Vietnam for two years.
The company’s manufacturing partners already produce several iPhones in India, and are also in talks to manufacture AirPods.
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Meanwhile, Apple CEO Tim Cook has committed to buying American-made chips at the new Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing plant in Arizona. TSMC is building two plants in the state, with the first slated to open in 2024 and the other in 2026.
Apple will start removing chips from the house in Arizona, which ends in 2024, around from Europe, primarily for a wide railway diversification, CEO Tim Cook has been working lately.
— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) November 15, 2022
Overall, as with other tech companies, 2022 was not easy for Apple. The Zhengzhou factory, also called iPhone City, was forced to shut down in October following the outbreak of COVID-19 under China’s strict “zero-covid” policy. Some Foxconn workers were quarantined on the territory of the factory with limited supplies of provisions: they began to flee from the territory, and later went on pickets.
Foxconn will pay workers $1,400 each to stop protests and quit iPhone City in Zhengzhou
Analysts say unrest in China will weigh on Apple’s December quarter, the company’s biggest quarter on record, boosted by the holiday shopping season. The company is expected to miss nearly 6 million iPhone 14 Pro units due to the protests.
