Cook: Apple will move some production to U.S.

Apple CEO Tim Cook was taped on Thursday answering questions for NBC'sRock Center. During the interview, the executive revealed that his company plans on moving production of a line of Macs to the U.S. from China. Apple has most of its products assembled in China, like the Apple iPhone, and the Apple iPad. But Cook noted that the most expensive part of building these consumer electronics is purchasing chips which are made in the U.S. Cook wouldn't reveal exactly which product will be made in the states, but did say that U.S. production would include more than just final assembly.

Apple's contract manufacturer in China, Foxconn, has been attacked by organizations for hiring underage workers and for generally poor working conditions. Cook said in the interview that companies like Apple have their assembly work done in China not just because of the lower salaries, but also because the manufacturing skills required to build, say, an Apple iPhone, aren't present in the U.S. anymore.

Apple CEO Tim Cook, interviewed for Rock Center

The U.S. based assembly line will cost Apple $100 million in 2013 and Cook said, "This doesn't mean that Apple will do it ourselves, but we'll be working with people and we'll be investing our money." The production being moved to the U.S. is a small part of the Cupertino based firms' overall business. Sales of the Apple iPhone and Apple iPad swamp sales of the company's Mac line of computers.

Under Cook's watch, Apple's shares have risen 43% even after Wednesday's huge decline, and the company has has released two new Apple iPhone models, two new versions of the Apple iPad and the Apple iPad mini. The CEO said it was time to bring some jobs back to the United States. While things have been going well for Apple, the executive did admit that the company made a mistake with Apple Maps. "We screwed up and we are putting the weight of the company behind correcting it," the executive said.

"On Maps, a few years ago, we decided that we wanted to provide customers features that we didn’t have in the current edition of Maps. It [Maps] didn’t meet our customers’ expectation, and our expectations of ourselves are even higher than our customers’. However, I can tell you, so we screwed up.-Tim Cook, Apple CEO

The interview with Tim Cook will be shown on Thursday night on Rock Center broadcast at 10pm/9pm central time on NBC.

source: NBCNews

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