“Central China’s Henan province plans to build the world’s largest manufacturing base for smart phones starting next year,” Star Chang reports for M.I.C. Gadget.
“The base will be centered on the Foxconn Science Park in Zhengzhou, provincial capital of Henan,” Chang reports. “The expansion plan, which will cost 7 billion yuan (US$1.1 billion), will increase its current production lines and expects to bring US$20 billion in sales revenue in 2012.”
Chang reports, “Foxconn’s factory plant in Zhengzhou was opened last year and it had large recruitment in order for the long run. Now the plant has already reached a daily production of 200,000 Apple iPhones, with 130,000 workers. Foxconn is looking to double iPhone’s output at the new expansion of Zhengzhou factory.”
More infer and photos in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
The picture of the workers in the factory is incredible. From the article, 130,000 workers build 200,000 phones a day or roughly 1 1/2 phones/worker/day. I imagined the plant would be far more automated than that.
Wasn’t there an article a while back about Foxconn’s plan to use a million robots to replace actual human workers with?
I wouldn’t be so sure that picture was of the factory in the story. Did anything in those black trays look like iPhones?
Caption for the picture in question: “The existing plant in Zhengzhou has already reached a daily production of 200,000 Apple iPhones.”
So abcd’s point would seem to be valid.
This isn’t just a factory, it’s a city within a city. The staff numbers probably include all the support people needed to feed, house and keep the factory workers going…
This is big news for earnings in 2012-2013! 200,000 incremental phones a day is approximately 50 million per year (200,000x5x50) if not more.
This suggests that Apple will experience a huge increase in sales after the new plant opens. I believe Apple is selling about 120 million phones annually right now, so this addition to capacity amounts to about 42% of existing production. Moreover, additional capacity may be planned elsewhere (such as Brazil).
50 million phones selling at (conservatively) $600 apiece will yield $30 billion in incremental revenues and over $10 billion in incremental earnings. That assumes all of the 50 million units can be sold.
Maybe I didnt say it the right way. I have to assume that all the components are made in fabrication plants offsite. Are they then assembled by hand at Foxconn?
The components come from all over the world especially Asia including Korea, Japan, Vietnam. Soon it will include Israel. Hence Foxconn is really an assembly plant. I assume that due to miniaturized components, most of the assembly is by hand or assisted robotic tools