The idea of a made-in-USA iPhone is one of those fantasies that refuses to die, despite Apple pointing out many times why it would be utterly impossible.
The Financial Times has now weighed in with a detailed report on why even the few American-made components aren’t really made in the country, and the 2,700 reasons why the idea is so wildly impractical …
Made-in-USA iPhone idea will not die
The idea has been around for more than a decade, getting new headlines back in 2016 when Trump first called on the company to do it. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology did the sums at the time, pointing out that assembling iPhones in the US would have surprisingly little financial impact on the costs – but that’s because if the process were moved to the US, it would be almost entirely automated, generating almost no US jobs.
There’s been plenty of discussion since then:
Most recently, a former Apple manufacturing engineer added his own view on the unrealistic nature of the idea.
The 2,700 reasons it won’t work
The FT has now performed a detailed analysis of the components that go into an iPhone, pointing out that there are a staggering 2,700 parts in the latest models. Most of these wouldn’t be recognized as such in a teardown, because what we see as one part actually has dozens of separate elements.
Altogether, more than 700 production sites make components for an iPhone, and just 30 Apple suppliers operate entirely outside China.
This is the biggest argument against the idea: those Chinese manufacturers are located very near to each other, and coordinate closely to produce the required parts. It took China literally decades to build the intricate supply chains that make products like the iPhone possible, and it would take just as long to recreate it anywhere else in the world.
Some iPhone components are made in the US, including the display glass and Face ID lasers. But, notes the piece, even that doesn’t tell the real story.
The iPhone’s display glass is made in the US, but the elements that make it a touchscreen, from the backlit display to the layer that enables interaction, are mostly made in South Korea and fixed in place in China.
Moving production to the US would also make no political sense, argues the FT. Right now the Trump administration is pressuring Apple, but even if the company made the decision to do it, the timescales are so long that nothing much would have happened before the end of the current presidency. Andy Tsay, professor of information systems at Santa Clara University, says it would make no sense to pander to a president who will be gone in less than four years.
“The American system as it stands, where everything can completely flip-flop every four years, is not conducive to business investment. When people and companies make investments, they need to have a longer horizon than that.”
The full piece is a fascinating read.
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