Chen Gen: In the face of the supply chain crisis, Apple has turned around?

Text/Chen Gen

The global shutdown brought about by the epidemic has affected all aspects of social life, especially the supply chain. Compared with the early stage of industrialization, the increasing complexity and networking of global product supply chains seems to have led to a reduction in the ability to resist risks, and under the impact of the epidemic, the highly globalized industrial chain is vulnerable.

For example, the North American Free Trade Area, led by the United States, is undoubtedly the most congested area of the current supply chain. In the past December, the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach on the west coast of the United States accounted for 40% of the total container imports in the United States, but about 100 cargo ships were stranded outside the port waiting to enter the port, more than 200,000 containers waiting to be disembarked, and 600,000 trucks are expected to be transported. Many Americans' eagerly awaited Christmas Day presents are still piled up on board. Physical, online and even large chain retailers are facing problems such as out-of-stock, supply outages, and delayed deliveries.

Behind the fragility and complexity of the supply chain is productivity and economic benefits, different economies in the production and sales of the comparative advantages are different, taking the iPhone as an example, the screen, camera suppliers in South Korea, Japan, assembly in China, stock listing in the United States, sales around the world, the industrial chain of various countries and the capital behind it are therefore benefiting. Under the crisis of supply chain globalization, countries and enterprises that cultivate supply chain resilience will inevitably get out of the supply chain crisis faster, and even gain development opportunities in this wave of crisis, such as Apple.

On the 27th, Apple announced record results and believed that the chip shortage was improving. Apple's victory over global chip supply shortages has brought good news to a troubled market. Bob O'Donnell, principal analyst at TECHnalysis Research, said, "For Apple, the supply-constrained problem has mostly been solved, but not necessarily for other companies," Reuters reported. ”

In fact, semiconductor companies tend to prioritize large companies like Apple because of their strong purchasing power, huge market demand for their products, and the ability of companies to customize orders for the components used in their products. Apple's high-end chips are expensive, which is attractive to chipmakers. This essentially means that Apple has the advantage and can source parts faster than its competitors.

Of course, while Apple has received better capacity support on more complex chips, it has also run into trouble with some mature process chips. Cook told analysts that the chips used in the iPad are chips with mature processes, and the supply of these mature process chips is particularly tight, resulting in a 14% drop in iPad revenue. During the holiday season, the restrictions on mature process chips or nodes are very obvious.

But overall, Cook believes that the constraints in the March quarter did improve compared to the December quarter. How to get out of the supply chain crisis, how to cultivate supply chain resilience, is now a problem on the table, and the first to solve the problem of the enterprise, will not only provide a reference sample, to guide the enterprises to build a supply chain, but also will get the opportunity in the crisis, firmly to the future development.