Apple has finally given up on building cars!
The decade-long, tens of billions of dollars, considered Apple's most ambitious project ever, ended in a strategic fiasco.
However, the fiasco of Apple's car-making project did not stem from the so-called too much roll in the trackIt is not just the failure of one company, the logic behind it directly exposes the most cruel side of the Sino-US decisive victory in front of the world
First of all, we need to understand a question: what is the ultimate purpose of a business?
Two words:Make money
Since the era of smart phones, Apple has been the most profitable company in the world, and everyone should note that it is the most profitable company, not a technology company, nor one of them.
In the fourteen-year expansion of the smartphone territory,With only 20% of the global market share, Apple has taken 90% of the profits of the entire industry, and its ability to make money is terrifying, even Huawei and all other Chinese counterparts combined, can't beat him by half a hand.
So how does Apple monopolize industry profits?
According to the 2023 financial report, Apple's revenue is composed of two parts:
One is hardware products, such as laptops, tablets, mobile phones, and watches, which account for 76% of total revenue;
The other is software services, namely recharge and ** commission, accounting for 24%.
In other words, the core track of Apple's profits is still in hardware products such as mobile phones and computers.
And the profits generated through hardware products, in addition to the significant premium, there is also the most critical point:Compress the cost of the **chain to the extreme!
AbsolutelyIf Apple wants to make money by compressing the cost of the ** chain, it must have absolute control over the ** business and even the power of life and death
Not only did they do this, but they did it like no one before!
Apple's control over the merchant is a four-step process.
The first step is to improve the strength of the best merchants and help them integrate into the fruit chain。If you look at Apple's financial reports over the years, you will find that as a technology company that has long been deproductive, Apple spends tens of billions of dollars every year on the purchase or research of various types of hardware production equipment.
And all these things were paid to the ** business enterprises that do OEM for AppleIn Foxconn's production line, 20% to 50% of the equipment developed or purchased by Apple is used
The reason is simple: Apple updates the process of its products every year, and the use of tailor-made equipment can not only ensure quality control, but also keep up with the pace of the market.
For example, in 2008, in order to introduce CNC technology on mobile phones and laptops, that is, digitally controlled precision machining, Apple spent $10 billion to purchase more than 10,000 machine tools and equipment from Japan, Germany, Sweden and other Seiko countries, and then distributed them all to the corresponding top suppliers.
Of course, capitalists are not philanthropicThe customized equipment assigned by Apple can only be used to produce Apple's products, and cannot be used for other similar products
The second step is to rely on industrial software to establish the East Fruit Chain Factory。In order to grasp the world's best chains in real time, Apple has a set of ERP system built with a huge amount of money.
From each factory to each assembly line, the data is collected in the network of this system in the form of node connections. It is like the Mingshi East Factory, which helps Apple to grasp every process link in real time.
Since all nodes are under the monitoring of the fruit chain Jinyiwei, and even in many cases, Apple discovers a detail problem on the production line, far earlier than the first business.
It can be said that with the blessing of modern information technology, Apple has truly achieved the one-way transparency pursued by the East Factory!
The third step is to enter the factory and establish a fruit chain to supervise the imperial history。In addition to ERP monitoring, almost every ** business has a history of monitoring sent by Apple. They are arranged into all product-related departments such as materials, R&D, procurement, production management, and after-sales.
In this system,Some are responsible for providing technical support; Some are responsible for communicating between Apple and the company, while others are responsible for supervising every move of the companyFor example, whether the production is strictly in accordance with the process, and whether there is data fraud or deception.
There is an east factory, and there is a supervising imperial history!
These two top-down systems, so that Apple even without any production capacity, but also to ensure absolute control over the overall production situation.
So much so that the personnel appointment and dismissal of the top businessmen, down to the placement of each machine, are all decided by Apple!
The fourth step is the interest **。The superior controls the overall situation, and pays attention to both grace and power.
Clause. The second and third steps are Wei, and the first and fourth steps are En.
As the world's most popular electronic product, Apple has never lacked a market, and whoever can stand on this big tree can make a lot of money even if they can only drink soup.
According to statistics,2019 In 2020, when the overall increase in A-shares was less than 40%, the share prices of several Apple companies such as Lixun Precision and Goertek rose by as much as 500%.
Thanks to the careful planning of the above four steps, Apple has become the head terminal enterprise with the greatest control over the business in human historyAnd this control not only benefits Apple a lot, but also consolidates the hegemony of the United States in the world
For Apple: The super control power not only compresses the cost of the chain to the extreme, but also gives it the power to kill and seize the life of the first business through risk transfer and benefits.
The construction of the industrial chain is an extremely risky and costly investment activity.
Therefore, if the first business wants to catch Apple's big money, it must spend a huge amount of money to expand the production line.
But because most of Apple's production equipment is customized, it cannot be OEM for other peers, if it is kicked out of the chain, what will be the result of losing orders?
The value of the assets can be as low as the value of the assets** and as the worst as direct bankruptcy
For example, Wingtech Technology was kicked out of the front camera module chain by Apple, and the company's stock price was cut in half.
There are also Goertek shares, two years ago, one of the company's complete products was suspended by overseas customers, triggering speculation that Apple was kicked out of the first chain, and the company's stock price fell on the same day, losing a market value of 8 billion.
The worst is O-film Optoelectronics, which suffered an annual loss of 2.7 billion after being kicked out of the ** chain by Apple, and the four subsidiaries under its name were forced to pack **, which was a sigh of relief.
In addition to manipulating the life and death power of Chinese companies, Apple also takes advantage of the concentration of China's manufacturing track and the serious involution of the companyIn order to enter the fruit chain, our enterprises will kill each other in a way that constantly lowers the **, so as to save costs for Apple
For example, the acoustic device war between Luxshare Precision and AAC Technology around the fruit chain caused the latter to lose four percentage points of gross profit margin.
And the price of Apple was 100 US dollars back then, and this time, profits naturally skyrocketed!
This is the most brutal side of the Sino-American manufacturing industry, we are not as good as others, but if we want to make a living in the rules set by others, we must be prepared to be judged by the opponent at any time
The showdown between the great powers is like a big wave sweeping sand!
In the past 40 years, the number of companies that have been ruled by the so-called rules of the opponent is not limited to the number of Ganges sands.
For the United States: Apple's super control over the top merchants has effectively maintained the hegemonic order of the US industrial pyramid.
At the bottom of the tower are the countries of the Middle East and Africa, which mainly supply industrial raw materials and are in a state of exploitation.
China and Southeast Asia are only a little higher in the pyramid, providing cheap labor to assemble products and earning a pitiful amount.
Further up, there are Japan and Europe, which are engaged in the production of some high-end industrial products and high-precision parts and components, and the income is enough to support them to live a luxurious and gorgeous life.
The United States is at the very top of the pyramid, they are engaged in the least productive activities, but they are able to live a flat life through the clever design of the pyramid, that is, exploitation layer by layer.
All the countries that are among the pyramids have their own place, and the well water must not interfere with the river water!
In order to maintain this hegemonic order and prevent other countries from overstepping it, the United States has specially designed two structures inside the pyramid.
The superstructure is the technology patent system distributed in the forefront of all walks of life, and if anyone oversteps their position, the United States will let any company that uses American patents or contains American technology cut off the supply to the country, otherwise it will not be allowed to use the dollar settlement system.
The lower foundation is the head enterprise like Apple, which is deeply relied on by the best businessmen.
If you are disobedient, I will let the head enterprise move out, and once the head enterprise moves out, your factories that support him will also have to move out.
As more and more businesses move out, the country will have a series of problems: such as a sharp spike in unemployment, a reduction in taxes, and even an economic crisis
In fact, in 2012, when the United States tried to de-sinicize the ** chain with TPP, Apple responded to the call of ** and leveraged a large number of Chinese manufacturers to transfer production capacity to Southeast Asia.
For example, after Foxconn's production line was put into production, Apple once promoted Goertek to invest in the construction of factories in Bac Ninh Province.
In addition, mainland companies such as Lixun Precision, Lens Technology, and Futong Microelectronics all have factories in Vietnam.
After Biden took office, the de-sinicization of the leading enterprises to drive the relocation of supporting enterprises made a comeback. In this context, Apple's transfer of production capacity to Vietnam and India is also accelerating.
Only in 2022,Apple kicked 13 Chinese companies out of the chain, which made the proportion of Chinese companies in the fruit chain from 258%, down to less than 10%.
At the same time, Apple is planning to replace one-third of China's production capacity in the Indian factory next year, as a way to further reduce the Chinese component in Apple's ** chain.
However, Apple's relocation did not trigger the collapse of China's industrial chain in a domino effect after round as expected by the United States.
Behind this, is the global rise of domestic manufacturers, supporting a blue sky for the best businessmen!
In September 2023, the mate60 was born, and Huawei mobile phones were reborn, and with it, there was also O-film, which was almost forced to go bankrupt by Apple.
With the arrival of orders from a large number of domestic manufacturers such as Huawei, OFILM turned losses into profits when it lost more than 5 billion yuan in 2022.
Why do Chinese love Huawei?
Here's the answer! Rong Ping still remembers Huawei's deafening speech at the forum on the chain in 2019:
For the support of domestic manufacturers, we need to use a more patient attitude to support manufacturers, and we can't say that we will give up because of a little gap in the product. Huawei hopes that industries such as screens and chips can flourish and allow more domestic manufacturers to participate
Not to mention tearing a hole from the technical wall of the West's strict barriers, he also wants to drive the entire domestic ** chain to attack the high-end market that has been entrenched in Europe and the United States for a long time!
In addition to Huawei, which other company has such momentum?
It is no secret that Huawei's successful breakthrough has brought China's ICT industry to a leading enterprise that can integrate the upstream and downstream of the entire chain.
At this point, the era when Apple could adjudicate the fate of China's top businessmen with one sentence is gone!
The funny thing is that Apple is completely unaware of this, and is trying to replicate the dominance and control of the management of the ** chain on the ** chain of car manufacturing.
For example, in 2022, in order to solve the battery matching problem, Apple set up a lot of strange terms in the negotiations with CATL, and asked CATL to build a factory in the United States.
Guess how CATL responded?
In short, in one sentence:Get lost! You're the oldest, and you deserve to talk to me
Different from mobile phones, China's new energy vehicle chain started very high, over the past ten years, with the efforts of domestic head car brands and their own, the technical level of most domestic enterprises has already achieved its own unique world, and almost every precision track has the existence of world-class enterprises.
Because of this, the identities of ** businessmen and head enterprises, especially foreign head enterprises, have long been reversed.
In the past, China's top businessmen had to rely on orders from foreign head companies to survive;
Now it is the leading enterprises that must rely on the parts of the Chinese top manufacturers to maintain the competitiveness of their products
We admit that Apple is very powerful, but in the new energy vehicle, you have to lie down for me, and you have to give Lao Tzu a coil if it is a tiger!
Technology is strength, product is confidence!
When the identity of the head enterprise and China's leading businessmen are reversed, Apple, which has lost its absolute control over the management of the first chain, will not be able to rely on Gu cannibalism and the right to speak to compress the cost of the first chain to the extreme.
In the post-Jobs era, Apple has lost its ability to innovate, and the myth that they can still maintain profitability is all due to the exploitation of businessmen.
But now the road has been completely blocked by China, which has crossed the industrial fence.
In addition, this year's Chinese auto market is seriously involuted, and all major manufacturers are red-eyed, and even Tesla, which has always sat firmly in the Diaoyutai, is like a big enemy, so how can Apple have the courage to end up?
Therefore, the failure of car manufacturing has become inevitable!
This year marks the 10th year that Apple has announced plans to build a car.
Ten years ago, when Apple announced the construction of a car in high spirits, China's top businessmen had to kill each other in Apple's elaborate poison in order to survive.
Ten years later, when Apple's car-building plan fell out of the picture, China's leading manufacturers had grown from adjudicators to adjudicators.
As a victim of the industrial showdown between China and the United States, the pyramid hegemony system of the United States controlling the global ** chain through leading enterprises is collapsing at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Ten years of change of world, ten years of offense and defense of easy shape!
The Americans, finally scared, so, shortly after Apple's failure to build a car, Biden announced that he would take unprecedented action against Chinese cars.
Their fear stems not only from the strong competitiveness of Chinese automobiles, but also from the fact that they have never seen a country develop to such a point without relying on colonization and hegemony in such a harsh environment. Even the Soviet Union, which was the world's hegemon at the time, had to rely on its victory in World War II to rise to become a superpower.
Therefore, they are afraid, not only of the strength of this country, but also of the potential of this nation.
Siege and interception are expected.
It has long been asserted that the essence of imperialism in maintaining hegemony will not change.
One day is imperialism, and one life is to enjoy hegemony!
But they don't understand :There has never been an eternal empire, let alone a thousand-year-old foundation, the only thing that has is only the inheritance from generation to generation because of the existence of the nation!
Why doesn't the West understand?
Because they don't have a great nation, let alone 5,000 years of responsibility!