Apple reportedly has asked its iPhone assemblers to consider moving production of the smartphone to the United States, the Nikkei Asian Review reported.
"Apple asked both Foxconn and Pegatron, the two iPhone assemblers, in June to look into making iPhones in the U.S.," the Nikkei Asian Review reported, citing a source.
"Foxconn complied, while Pegatron declined to formulate such a plan due to cost concerns," the report said. Taiwan-based Foxconn and Pegatron assemble iPhones in China.
"Making iPhones in the U.S. means the cost will more than double," the source said.
The person added that one view among the Apple supply chain in Taiwan is that U.S. President-elect Donald Trump may push the Cupertino, California-based tech titan to make a certain number of iPhone components at home, the Review reported.
Trump has urged U.S. companies to build their products in America.
"We're going to get Apple to build their damn computers and things in this country instead of in other countries," Trump said in a speech in January.
He also said that he would slap a 45 percent import tariff on Chinese goods.
Trump and Apple have had strained relations.
Under CEO Tim Cook's leadership, Apple has become more outspoken on controversial topics ranging from gay marriage to environmental conservation, The Verge reports, and Cook has embraced a more active political role. Apple's late co-founder Steve Jobs disdained Washington, Politico notes.
Apple has already told Republican Party officials they wouldn't contribute financially or in any other way to the GOP convention in Cleveland because of Trump's incendiary remarks about Hispanics, women and other groups. Amid the legal battle with the FBI over unlocking the iPhone of San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook, Trump called for a boycott on Apple's products.
Some economic experts have warned that Trump’s plans to raise tariffs on China, withdraw from NAFTA, and upened globalization would surely set off a trade war and hurt the markets.
Newsmax Finance Insider Patrick Watson, for his part, disagrees. "I think Trump can’t start a trade war because we are already in one. It’s been going on for years, right under our noses… and it’s happening in cyberspace," Watson wrote for Newsmax.
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