Apple have given up the means of production if true they are doomed

[gaelic cowboy]

Yes but I still think Star-wars is better then LotR and that the EU and the UN were founded by Hitler.

Agreement wth?

with the below comments obviously

Asia has a major problem as well, they are over-stretching, they can make cheap stuff but they will always demand on the west to buy it if they keep going like this, the average Chinese doesn't benefit from this huge shift of economic power, the chance on civil unrest is considerate. They (in this case I specifically mean China) can do that only for so long. But it's one bad machine that China, immensely powerful.

I suppose the main thing to take away is yes China could collapse but that would be just as disastrous for western companies as it would for China. If your company has totally relocated production to the east then if china collapsed your suppliers are gone now if any one of your competetiors kept a company or two at home they have all the market not good idea long term

[Tellos Athenaios]

For most companies outsourcing should be a short term solution. Initial competitive advantages (lower costs) degrade over time, but the disadvantages stick (longer line of communications, less control over the final product; typically workers with lesser skillset). This is why, for example, India is still not the Mecca of IT outsourcing it once was predicted to be(come).

[gaelic cowboy]

Another thing I forgot is actually its twice the work for management if you outsource and have very tight supply lines you have to continually be in contact with suppliers and even there subsuppliers to ensure smooth production. Little nugget from my own experience is when there was a fire in one of the INTEL fabs it affected Motorolla badly cos there supply lines were very tight and they lost serious market share. There competitors bought all the chips availabe because they did not just rely on the say so of INTEL that production would be back ontrack soon and of course Motorolla had no way to make there own chips.

[Husar]

Another thing I forgot is actually its twice the work for management if you outsource and have very tight supply lines you have to continually be in contact with suppliers and even there subsuppliers to ensure smooth production. Little nugget from my own experience is when there was a fire in one of the INTEL fabs it affected Motorolla badly cos there supply lines were very tight and they lost serious market share. There competitors bought all the chips availabe because they did not just rely on the say so of INTEL that production would be back ontrack soon and of course Motorolla had no way to make there own chips.

Had there been a difference if Motorola had had their own factory and their own factory had burned down? Had!*

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

*Yes, past-terms confuse me sometimes, feel free to correct it.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

The eventual Chinese produced american Ipod will become a Chinese produced Chinese Ipod if Apples not careful.

But it won't be called an iPod, so what does Apple have to worry about? It seems like it would be more of an issue for other companies.

[gaelic cowboy]

But it won't be called an iPod, so what does Apple have to worry about? It seems like it would be more of an issue for other companies.

Because Apple would not be able to produce anything at all having shifted production to China they would in effect have lost the ability to produce Ipods

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Because Apple would not be able to produce anything at all having shifted production to China they would in effect have lost the ability to produce Ipods

Yeah, but why would the production companies suddenly quite making apple iPods unless they can sell their chinese iPod's?