back to article Foxconn: Our hiring freeze has nothing to do with iPhone 5

Apple's main manufacturing buddy Foxconn has frozen hiring at a Shenzhen plant and other factories across China, but denies it has anything to do with the fruity firm in particular. The parts-manufacturer for tech firms ranging from Apple to Dell said today that it wasn't slowing down recruitment because of any particular …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The FT is heavily biased. Pinch of salt?

    Look at the bigger picture and it can be seen that it's not just Apple having to deal with a slow in demand (no matter how great they think their ithings are).

  2. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    last paragraph...

    "Apple sold fewer iPhones than expected over the holidays at 47.8 million, sparking speculation that fanbois might finally be tiring of Jesus-mobe upgrades while Android gains market share"

    That's not what the numbers are saying:

    http://blogs.strategyanalytics.com/HCST/post/2013/02/20/Strategy-Analytics-Apple-iPhone-5-Becomes-Worlds-Best-Selling-Smartphone-Model-in-Q4-2012.aspx

    1. lurker

      Re: last paragraph...

      The thing you are missing is that not so long ago Apple WAS the smartphone market, more or less, with more apple phones selling than all android phones combined. The article you linked lists an 'others' figure, which will be almost entirely android smartphones, with a number which dwarfs the units shifted by Apple. So the trend is most definitely towards Android gaining market share.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: last paragraph...

        Well yes, that's called 'first-mover advantage'. What you seemingly fail to comprehend is that there was only 1 initial Android device released in September 2008 (HTC G1 I believe) with a ~9 month gap between the next devices to be released In the 4.33 years since the market place has been saturated with 300 or so Android *phones* released - many of which were given away with contracts. Apple have release 6 and still, despite what El Reg want us to believe, dominate the sales. If you look at the numbers based on this particular piece of research, it appears that the share of the market place that Apple have has increased over the last quarter. It's also worth noting that the 'Other' category also contains iPhone 4 sales, as well as Windows, Blackberry and the rest. Most importantly in business terms, Apple own the profits. This with Samsung out-spending Apple's marketing by quite some margin. It would also be reasonable to assert that Samsung are Android.

        1. lurker

          Re: last paragraph...

          The article you quote states that "Apple’s iPhone 5 and iPhone 4S together accounted for 1 in 5 of all smartphones shipped worldwide in Q4 2012". Obviously that's impressive, but I don't see that you can really describe it as 'dominating the sales' in the way that they used to. Clearly Apple "own the profits" as you say, but since they don't seem to do much with it other than store it off-shore from the US so as to not pay tax, I'm not sure that this really matters much in terms of the article concerned.

          I have owned both Apple and Android smartphones and currently own neither, so really I'm not deeply bothered, but as a 'neutral observer' it still seems to me that the market is distinctly shifting away from Cupertino and towards the little green robot guy. Perhaps I'm just wrong, I guess time will tell.

          At any rate, I get the strong impression that you care more about this than I do so I'll leave you to it :).

  3. frank ly

    Between the lines

    "Due to an unprecedented rate of return of employees following the Chinese New Year holiday compared to years past, ...."

    Translation: We were amazed when so many came back to us after we allowed them to leave the factory. The economy must be bad out there.

  4. Joey
    FAIL

    Yawn...

    'Fruity-firm', 'Jesus-mobe'. Don't you have any new clichés up your sleeve. These ones are past their sell-by.

    1. Ted Treen
      Devil

      Re: Yawn...

      No new clichés.

      Both Parnell and Leach will still be spitting anti-Apple invective for years to come.

      Regarding the stuff regularly based upon the ramblings of some third-rate analyst somewhere, as SimB stated "That's not what the numbers are saying". If only I had a tenner for every time some richard-headed analyst has spouted pure drivel and subsequently proved to be 100% inaccurate, I'd be able to retire.

      Journalists pandering to the anti-Apple mob are not doing themselves, their employers or their readers any favours.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Yawn...

      'up your sleeve', 'sell-by' Don't you have any new clichés either?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Yawn...

        "Don't you have any new clichés"???

        Don't YOU have any new clichés?

  5. Steve Evans
    Coat

    Well...

    Given the Chinese one child policy, maybe the country has just run out of cheap labour available for hire?

    Mine's the flame proof one - try it!

  6. paulej72

    Suicide Nets

    With all the new suicide nets, maybe they do not need to hire new employees at such a great pace. Just recycle the jumpers instead of replacing.

  7. IGnatius T Foobar

    It has *everything* to do with Apple.

    It has *everything* to do with Apple. Anyone who owns an Apple product is *directly* responsible for 11 year old girls being forced into slave labor at Foxconn.

    1. Goldmember
      Facepalm

      Re: It has *everything* to do with Apple.

      "Forced", "slave labour".... deary, deary me. People queue up and beg for jobs at Foxconn, as the shit conditions there are heavenly compared to some of the other jobs in the area.

      I take it you don't own a smart phone, TV, games console, PC or laptop, as you feel so strongly about the poor working conditions in Shenzhen, where practically every electronic device in the world is made? Many of which (not just Apple's iShite) are also incidentally made by Foxconn.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It has *everything* to do with Apple.

        Buy a Raspbery Pi, proudly made in Britain!

  8. Maliciously Crafted Packet

    The Bad News is...

    "Apple sold fewer iPhones than expected over the holidays at 47.8 million"

    The Good News is The Apple iPhone 5 Overtakes Samsung Galaxy S3 to Become World's Best-Selling Smartphone Model in Q4 2012

    Not only that but so did the iPhone 4S

    Just saying like.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The Bad News is...

      Only an anal-ist desperate to find something negative to say can find it in the Apple numbers. And in order to construct their argument, it is always necessary to make some many logical errors as to render the conclusion invalid by definition.

      Dweeb

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The Bad News is... @Maliciously Crafted Packet

      Indeed. It is interesting to note that anal-ists are falling all over their big swinging dicks claiming Apple must release an entry level (read: cheap and and nasty pos) device, yet Apple's "entry level device is in fact doing extremely well.

      The 4S is very good value and 27m punters apparently agreed.

      Why dilute the brand with a pos for poor people? It serves no purpose.

      Dweeb

  9. RightPaddock
    Childcatcher

    maybe Foxconn is about to open the robotised factory its been promising - probably in Taiwan

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @RightPaddock

      the Foxconn supremo indicated in the same source article that 5-10 years is the time frame for removing all repetitive movement tasks from the production lines via robots (or something along those lines)

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like