Cash-strapped Sharp puts HQ, factories in hock

OUCH

Well, recall that Sharp slogan (one I to which I found warm humor and chuckles in):

"From SHARP minds come SHARP products".

Now, those words may hurt apple in the ass if Sharp cannot fix it's production problems. If they get very deep into apple, it could hurt as in "From Sharp minds come SHARP prod ducts" as they wend their way back toward profitability.

That seems insane, though: mortgaging ALL their Japan-based/domestic property and other assets there and elsewhere in other parts of the world to borrow a schload of money that almost assuredly will be wiped out in a handful of months just on the learning curve and the machinery tweaks. IF the iPhone sells well (as it most assuredly will), you can bet that Apple will take a deep bite in the pre-profits cash and hawkishly monitor the books to ensure that Sharp will have to be VERY sharp and not just Sharp to actually get a recovery on its mortgaging scheme which might come back to haunt Sharp severely.

Apple can sell all the phones it wants or can, but it would be a tragedy for a lot of people if Sharp got steam-rolled out of gree... umm, eagernes to get that possibly lucrative contract.

OTOH, as suggested above in a post before mine, Apple might be forced to invest deeply in Sharp if Sharp starts stumbling. Even Apple doesn't want to be in the business of owning a manufacturing facility (after all, Apple shed most of the remainder of if not ALL of their physical production plants by the late 90s, IIRC, and I do recall as a courier in the 90s driving past a LOT of Apple facilities in Campbell, Cupertino, Fremont, and a few other places when they IIRC had or owned more than 20 buildings in that area alone, not counting their then-growing collection of office campuses) which cannot be easily and on-the-spot reconfigured. If Apple suddenly vanished, I am pretty sure that Hon Hai/Foxconn would keep chugging along as other companies would suddenly be in a commanding posittion to demand better pricing and Foxconn could divert feverishly humming resoures to others, until those companies peter out.

Does anyone know what stops Foxconn from being able to make more of what Apple wants/needs? Is it lack of tech, lack of expertise, lack of patents, or something else or all of those? Maybe we we'll see a new "AppSharpConn"? Or "ShaPpleConn"?

This is not good news.

I worked in the kitchens of their Manchester plant as a student in the 80s. And I also worked for Tandy, who rebadged loads of their kit and sold it under their Realistic name. It was good merchandise, and a great place to work.

This is a rather drastic step for them to take. I hope they can pull it off.

Why do Samsung

Not buy out Sharp?

that would REALLY stick it to Apple in the process