A teaser has been released by NBC News of an interview with current Apple CEO Tim Cook that will air tonight on "Rock Center" in which the CEO of the most valuable private company in the world will, beginning in 2013, move back the full production of one of its Mac computer lines wholly back to the United States.
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From a New York Times article just posted breaking the same news:
The company plans to spend $100 million on the American manufacturing in 2013, according to the interviews, a small fraction of its overall factory investments and an even tinier portion of its available cash.
In the interviews, Mr. Cook suggested the company would work with partners and that the manufacturing would be more than just the final assembly of parts. He noted that parts of the company’s ubiquitous iPhone, including the “engine” and the glass screen, were already made in America. The processor is manufactured by Samsung in Texas, while Corning makes the glass screen in Kentucky.
It's worth pointing out that Apple currently sits on a cash mountain of $121 billion, with that number
expected to grow to $210 billion (!!!) by the year 2014 due to its utter domination of the consumer electronic market that has propelled the company to record profits after record profits.
It's interesting to note that Apple suffered a blow to it's image and somewhat of a PR nightmare after the New York Times published a thorough investigative report on the appalling conditions at the Foxconn factories in China where Apple and several of the world's largest electronics corporations manufacture their products.
Whether this is a response to the blows the company took as a result of the bad publicity, or a renewed sense of corporate responsibility and desire to behave a little more patriotically than in the past with the safety of so much cash in the bank, the bottom line is that for the first time in at least 20 years, beginning in 2013 consumers all over the world will actually be able to purchase a computer MADE IN THE USA.
I'll finish with this quote from Cook on the Times piece:
“I don’t think we have a responsibility to create a certain kind of job,” Mr. Cook said in the Businessweek interview. “But I think we do have a responsibility to create jobs.”
I hope this is the beginning of something truly extraordinary, even if somewhat symbolic, for the rebirth of US manufacturing.