President Trump has suggested that Apple manufacture its devices in the United States. But things aren’t quite so easy as that — as a New York Times article makes clear.
It describes the challenges Apple faced when it tried making its top-of-the-line Mac Pro in the U.S. several years ago. One of the big problems? Simply, that Apple couldn’t get hold of enough screws to assemble the $3,000 computers in Austin, Texas.
The report cites three people who worked on the project, speaking anonymously due to confidentiality agreements. It claims that:
“In China, Apple relied on factories that can produce vast quantities of custom screws on short notice. In Texas, where they say everything is bigger, it turned out the screw suppliers were not. Tests of new versions of the computer were hamstrung because a 20-employee machine shop that Apple’s manufacturing contractor was relying on could produce at most 1,000 screws a day.
The screw shortage was one of several problems that postponed sales of the computer for months, the people who worked on the project said. By the time the computer was ready for mass production, Apple had ordered screws from China.”
In the grand scheme of things, finding enough screws for the housing of a computer is a relatively small part of the overall manufacturing process. That’s exactly the point, however.
Read more at CultOfMac.com