REFERENCE:

CASE STUDY: The Dilemma between US Economy and Apple's Offshore Production in China

RESULTS (Describes what you found through your investigations, e.g., the main themes that came out in research, interviews, responses to questionnaires, significant observations.)

A.The effects of Apple's offshore supply chain decisions

The case study represents the dilemma between Apple's offshore production strategy and the economic condition of the United States. Apple was mainly manufactured in the company's plant established in California and they believed that in-shore production of the company's items is a better aspect. However, it slowly turned towards foreign manufacturing by 2004 and started sourcing the different manufactured components of the iPhone from different areas of the world such as Germany, China, Korea, Japan, and so on. It is clearly acclaimed by the company that major jobs pertaining to designing, software development and others are still kept for US based employees and the company provides employment to various suppliers in the country as well. The reason behind sourcing the items from China is basically the lower cost of manufacturing due to cheap labor and the quick responsiveness from Chinese manufacturers to change the scale of production as per company's requirements. Further, the availability of engineers in China is quite high as compared to the United States. Moreover, the clustering of factories together makes China a better place to work upon manufacturing activities. Apple's choice, on the other hand, has consequences for the company, including its relationship with the United States economy and other countries, Apple's management system, and Apple's brand.

The offshoring practices of Apple impacted their supply chain management in terms of relationship with the United States and other countries. The company plays a big role in the U.S. economy as they are the sources of huge employment and facilities in the United States and also creates a huge hub for data center operations and software development.

Apple's relationship with the US economy is quite unstable. The business has said that they are responsible for the creation of about 2.4 million jobs in the nation, which would add $350 billion to the US economy, as well as assisting over 9,000 US-based suppliers in manufacturing specialized components for the company's products (Aten, 2019). However, as a result of the company's continued outsourcing of manufactured goods to countries such as Japan, Korea, and China, the company was accused and criticized of exporting American jobs and harming the US economy, to which Apple attempted to respond by creating more software-related jobs in the country. Apple's relationship with other nations seems to be very amicable and beneficial since it created millions of jobs in manufacturing and component manufacture. China has been one of their best suppliers, and countries such as Germany, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Africa, and Asia are also considered to be major countries where Apple has improved relationships with manufacturers and suppliers, resulting in the creation of millions of jobs and boosting their economies.

With regard to Apples' management system, its effect is positive. Since Apple selected such subcontractors from abroad countries that ensured to fulfil their demands at minimal cost, the growth in their business continues. Apple's system of management that is primarily focused upon finding the low-cost alternatives for various raw materials required for manufacturing the items such as iPhone is applying the methods of recycling and reusing to generate a renewable supply chain (Brown, 2020). The company has been sourcing different parts from all over the world from which it was able to get the required item at the cheapest rates. Thus, the entire iPhone might cost quite a bit but the availability of lower cost alternatives, such as cheap labor from China, Copper from Peru, advanced semiconductors from Germany, and others low-cost items help them to manufacture the product at lower rates which is sold at a greater price.

WHAT TO DO:

Make a SWOT Analysis of the given resources, find more article/essay if needed connected to the results.

After finding the weakness, give 3 alternative course of action with advantage and disadvantage of each with your explanation.

Now that you have SWOT and 3 ACA, what is your recommendation/proposal for future action to solve the three problems of Apple given:

• in Global production
• in Supply chain
• in Product price