APPLE NEWS
ANDROID @ CHINA
CHINA TECH
GREAT FIREWALL
KNOCKOFFS
WTF?
CULTURE:CHINA
Part I happened on July 20. And now, another employee attempt to commit suicide at Foxconn. Luckily, it’s unsuccessful, thanks for the safety net which has surrounded the building. China Business News reporter has confirmed the suicide’s news, the incident take place at Kunshan, JiangSu Province, not in Shenzhen. A female worker jumped down from the building early this morning, caught by the safety net, in the end she’s slightly injured. The cause of the suicide is being investigated, no comments from the police and authorities at the moment, while the Chinese mainstream media keeping the news at low key. We think that the suicide cluster from Foxconn will just keep going and going, non-stop … oh please, we really have enough for this. Click in for the Chinese video news report, sorry, no English subtitle.
UPDATE: The worker has died, the safety net doesn’t work …
A worker at an affiliate of Foxconn died Tuesday after falling from a dorm building. It was unclear whether the latest death was also a suicide. The China Xinhua news agency said the 18-year-old fell from the sixth floor of a building belonging to Chimei Innolux Corp, which is located at Foshan city. (Chimei Innolux Corp is Taiwan’s largest LCD maker, a unit of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd, which also controls Foxconn International Holdings, info here) Xinhua said the local government and police had confirmed the death and a manager at Foxconn in Shenzhen, which is not far from Foshan, also verified the information. The cause of death is being investigated. Click in for the Chinese TV news report (sorry, no English subtitle). We will update the story when we get more info. [YahooNews via Xinhua, iFeng]
An executive from the Foxconn Group has denied a recent rumor circulating in China’s IT market that Apple is paying Foxconn a 2% subsidy on its labor costs as compensation for the company’s recent increases in minimum wages. According to Chinese news report, the rumor is purely a speculation and Foxconn has never received any subsidies from Apple.
After two times of wages increase, and suspension of recruitment, Foxconn is preparing to shift part of its production lines from Shenzhen to north and central part of China. According to China Economic Observer news report, the mobile phone division will move to Tianjin, while the making of personal computers will moved to Chongqing and Wuhan. Interestingly, Foxconn will continue building Apple’s products in Shenzhen…
No kidding, Foxconn CEO’s little brother is planning to open 100 Apple retail outlets in China, within three years time. The two brothers, may join forces together to build the best Apple Premium Reseller store and transform tech gadgets into Louis Vuitton.
According to Korea news report, the iPhone 4 is indeed ‘Made in Korea’, not China. The main component inside iPhone 4, the processor, display screen, internal storage and battery are all produced by Korea’s company. So we have just understand that iPhone is actually assembled in China instead, not really a gadget that is ‘Made in China’. We are sure that the casing shell of iPhone 4 is made by Foxconn, they are one of the excellent manufacturers on die casting for electronic products …
After the 2 times of wages increase and stop giving suicide compensation, Foxconn latest action is suspension of recruitment. According to China Business News report, Foxconn has stopped all recruitment in Shenzhen since May 29th and there is no further detail on when is the next recruitment. Before the suspension, Foxconn recruits about 7,000 to 8,000 new employees per day, and starting from April, the management has already re-adjusted the duration of the overtime work, to a limit of 2 hours per employee. So Foxconn has stopped recruitment and carried out overtime control, will they be able to complete the new orders from Apple?
After Apple’s iPhone 4 announcement, Foxconn held their annual shareholders meeting in Taiwan and Hong Kong, and CEO Terry Gou has proclaim some interesting details on the suicide tragedy. He told the Taiwan press and shareholders, the company have evidence that some employee killed themselves is because of the financial payoff, thus Foxconn will end the suicide compensation. Guo was also frustrated that the media had created a bad social image on him…
Looks like not everyone is happy to see the new product’s announcement from Apple. Some protesters in Hong Kong show up and accuse Apple and Foxconn for their poor corporate ethics after a recent spate of suicides at the Shenzhen factory in China. About 30 demonstrators gather outside a hotel function room where HK Foxconn having their shareholders meeting. They were waving a cardboard cutout of Steve Jobs with devil’s horns and another placard featuring the company logo and the words “Bloody Apple”. Later they went to one of the Apple shop and laid white flowers in a tribute to the dead workers. Click in to watch the video.
Apple showed us the manufacturing of iPhone 4 in their design video which was posted on their site. In the video, we see lots of crazy machines in action and all these stuff belong to Foxconn. We strongly believe Foxconn could develop into Skynet and build real Terminators someday in the future. Click in for some cool screen shots from the video.
M.I.C. REVIEWS
RECENT UPDATES
FEATURED VIDEO
LATEST M.I.C. PRODUCTS
POPULAR STORIES
HOT ARCHIVES
LATEST COMMENTS
STAY IN TOUCH
