foxconn

Apple is teaming up with Foxconn to invest money to try to improve conditions for the supplier's factory workers.

Plagued by reports of poor working conditions at plants in China, Foxconn chief Terry Gou confirmed the news today but didn't give a dollar amount or indicate how much each company would spend, according to Reuters.

"We've discovered that this (improving factory conditions) is not a cost. It is a competitive strength," Gou told reporters earlier today. "I believe Apple sees this as a competitive strength along with us, and so we will split the … Read more

Cheerleaders for Apple's iPad can get out their pom-poms (and perhaps their passports). As of this weekend, the new iPad will be available in 30 more countries, including Brazil, Botswana, Cambodia, Malta, Mauritius, and Qatar, according to MacRumors.

Apple's Web site lists 13 countries in the Caribbean and Latin America and says, "the new iPad is arriving in these countries on May 11th." MacRumors did some further digging on the tech company's country-specific store pages and found that 17 other countries will be selling the tablet as of this weekend (see full list of new … Read more

Apple fans were seething.

In January, they heard actor Mike Daisey describe during a radio broadcast the intolerable working conditions he witnessed at Chinese factories where iPads and iPhones are assembled. Many found their way to an online petition started at Change.org by a man named Mark Shields. The petition demanded Apple improve safety at these facilities, and it would eventually include 256,000 names.

At first, the petition appeared to have simply bubbled up from an outraged public.

Not quite. Apple fan or not, the 36-year-old Shields is a professional advocate and activist. The public-relations firm that has … Read more

Apple doesn't want jurors to see Samsung's logo on court video equipment, which is just one of many courtroom requests the two companies have made as they prepare to take their patent issues to trial.

With the upcoming jury trial currently set for July 30, the two have already revealed the issues they plan to raise ahead of their courtroom showdown, according to Foss Patents' Florian Mueller.

Apple's intention to file a motion to obscure the Samsung logo on the court's video displays may seem "funny," says Mueller. But Apple doesn't want to … Read more

Foxconn parent company Hon Hai Precision Industry mustered a sizable profit during the first quarter, but its gains were tempered by rising employment costs.

During the first quarter, Hon Hai generated a profit of NT$14.9 (about $510 million), up slightly from the NT$14.4 billion profit it posted during the first quarter of 2011. According to Dow Jones Newswires, which polled eight analysts who profile Hon Hai, the profit was well below consensus of NT$22.1 billion in earnings.

Hon Hai's profit margin slid from 7.25 percent last year to 4 percent this year. … Read more

Foxconn workers in a facility in Wuhan City in China reportedly threatened to jump off a building if their demands for higher wages were not met.

According to the Hong Kong-based activist group Information Centre for Human Rights (Translate), as many as 200 workers from the Foxconn facility climbed a building and said that they would collectively jump if the company didn't address wage issues. Soon after, local police arrived on the scene, and the workers returned to work.

Reuters, which first reported on the news, spoke to someone representing Foxconn owner Hon Hai Precision Industry, who said the … Read more

Around 2,500 workers at Foxconn's plant in Jundiai in the state of Sao Paulo in Brazil could choose to strike on May 3 if management refuses to meet their demands.

Employees have been complaining of severe shortages in food and water and overcrowding on the buses used for transportation, according to the Journal de Jundia (English translation).

A director of the local union told the Journal that food has had to be sent in but that the quality is poor, and the lines to wait for a meal are long. Travel to work is also a problem for … Read more

The small Brazilian city of Jundiai is one step ahead of Cupertino in paying tribute to Apple's late co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs. Jundiai's city council officially announced that one of its street is being renamed "Steve Jobs Avenue," according to Cult of Mac.

The avenue is the route that connects the small city to Brazil's largest city -- Sao Paulo. It also houses the proposed new address for Taiwanese-owned Foxconn's new iPad manufacturing factory. Nearby Sao Paulo is where Foxconn just opened a facility to produce iPhones.

Jundiai's city council presented the … Read more

Ever want to see an iPad being made?

Rob Schmitz, the public radio journalist who exposed Apple commentator Mike Daisey's fabrications regarding working conditions at a Chinese electronics factory, recently got a first-hand look at how the iPad is made.

Schmitz, the bureau chief of Marketplace Shanghai, is only the second Western journalist to have access to the factory floor since Daisey's falsified report about hazardous working conditions suffered by employees at a Foxconn factory in China.

Schmitz has been filing reports for public radio as well as writing a blog on his experience at Foxconn. During one … Read more