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posted by n1 on Sunday September 21 2014, @08:22PM   Printer-friendly
from the because-you're-poor dept.

Many startups want to design something that mimics the fit and finish of an Apple product, but it's a good way to go out of business.

What happened when Apple wanted to CNC machine a million MacBook bodies a year? They bought 10k CNC machines to do it. How about when they wanted to laser drill holes in MacBook Pros for the sleep light but only one company made a machine that could drill those 20 µm holes in aluminum? It bought the company that made the machines and took all the inventory. And that time when they needed batteries to fit into a tiny machined housing but no manufacturer was willing to make batteries so thin? Apple made their own battery cells. From scratch.

Other things that Apple often does that can cause problems for a startup include white plastic (which is the most difficult color to mold), CNC machining at scale (too expensive), Laser drilled holes (far more difficult than it may seem), molded plastic packaging (recycled cardboard is your friend), and 4-color, double-walled, matte boxes + HD foam inserts (It's not unusual for them to cost upwards of 12 US$/unit at scale. And then they get thrown away.).

If you see a feature on an Apple device you want to copy, try to find it on another company's product. If you do, it's probably okay to design into your product. Otherwise, lower your expectations. I assure you it'll be better for your startup.

Foxconn, the Apple supplier that doubled factory pay after a spate of worker suicides, buys 800 programmable Robodrills from Fanuc every month - for about 62 000 US$ each - to make the stainless steel band that wraps around the iPhone. The Fanuc Robodrill is the world's common CNC machine measured by installation numbers and by total value thanks to Apple.

Seems form and style are essential for the marketplace (yuck).

Edit: It's come to our attention that this was originally submitted to Slashdot by Hugh Pickens and some of the text appears to have been copied. We apologize for the mis-attribution. Further, this practice is frowned upon, you must write an original submission when submitting article summaries.

Related Stories

China Trade War Could Push iPhone Contractor Foxconn to Build in Mexico 25 comments

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/08/china-trade-war-could-push-iphone-contractor-foxconn-to-build-in-mexico/

For years, iPhones (or their boxes) have said that they were "designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China." But thanks to an escalating trade war between the US and China, that might not be true in the coming years. Reuters reports that two of Apple's biggest manufacturing contractors, Foxconn and Pegatron, are working to expand their facilities in Mexico with an eye toward eventually building iPhones there.

[...] This isn't Foxconn's only effort to diversify away from China. Last year, Foxconn announced plans to begin manufacturing iPhones in India, and the company is now manufacturing the iPhone SE there.

Sources told Reuters that Taiwan-based iPhone contractor Pegatron is also considering a shift to Mexico, but few details about its plans are known.

Previously:

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  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday September 21 2014, @08:57PM

    by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Sunday September 21 2014, @08:57PM (#96446) Homepage

    I don't manufacture like Apple because I aint'a limp-wristed vaginismus stinkius.

    Ho ho haa haa HAAA! Suck it, btiches!

    • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by Tork on Sunday September 21 2014, @09:02PM

      by Tork (3914) Subscriber Badge on Sunday September 21 2014, @09:02PM (#96453)
      Hey guys, Ethanol Fueled is having a bad day. Can we all be extra nice to him?
      --
      🏳️‍🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️‍🌈
  • (Score: 0, Offtopic) by buswolley on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:24PM

    by buswolley (848) on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:24PM (#96480)

    Do all stories need to come from /. ?

    --
    subicular junctures
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Tramii on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:42PM

      by Tramii (920) on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:42PM (#96486)

      Do all stories need someone complaining about them coming from Slashdot?

      How to solve your "problem":
      (pick one)

      1) Realize that the editors are not going to reject a story just because it was posted on Slashdot, and accept that articles will occasionally appear on both sites.
      2) Start submitting your own high-quality stories that never were posted to Slashdot.
      3) Stop reading Slashdot.

      • (Score: 4, Insightful) by cykros on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:53PM

        by cykros (989) on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:53PM (#96490)

        You left out

        4) Remember that neither SN or /. are actually about the stories in the first place, but the community commentary and range of discussion for which the news stories are only an initial stimulus.

        The biggest reason we left /. in the first place was that they were acting like the community was somehow secondary to the badly written summaries of old news stories which was the only other thing the site had to offer once you refer to the community as an audience. I couldn't give any fewer fucks about whether or not a story shows up on both sites, despite having both in my RSS aggregator, simply because at least once they pop up here, I can see some reasonable discussion, rather than whatever it is you'd call what the comments over at /. have degraded into. If an actual news story is news on either site, it's merely a welcome oddity...certainly not something I've come to expect.

        • (Score: 2) by cykros on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:55PM

          by cykros (989) on Sunday September 21 2014, @10:55PM (#96491)

          Sorry, post of shame here for not previewing carefully enough. It should read:

          4) Remember that neither SN or /. AREN'T actually about the stories in the first place, but the community commentary and range of discussion for which the news stories are only an initial stimulus.

          • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @11:30PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @11:30PM (#96502)

            Where's your post of double shame for not realising that you were actually correct the first time and the post of shame merely introduced a double negative that provides the opposite meaning to what you intended?

    • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 22 2014, @12:35AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 22 2014, @12:35AM (#96515)

      I wrote this story and submitted it to slashdot yesterday at:

      http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/14/09/20/1651241/why-you-cant-manufacture-like-apple [slashdot.org]

      Somebody has copied my story word for word, added two short paragraphs at the end, and passed if off as their own.

      I do not find this acceptable. Please write your own stories.

      Best Regards,

      Hugh Pickens

      • (Score: 2) by buswolley on Monday September 22 2014, @01:10AM

        by buswolley (848) on Monday September 22 2014, @01:10AM (#96530)

        Hugh,
        Soylent news has been a pretty good sight, but the editors should try to check for these types of things...especially when it comes to duplicating Slashdot on interest pieces like this one.

        --
        subicular junctures
        • (Score: 2) by buswolley on Monday September 22 2014, @01:18AM

          by buswolley (848) on Monday September 22 2014, @01:18AM (#96532)

          Phonetic speller when distracted. Site, not sight. ergh.

          --
          subicular junctures
        • (Score: 3, Informative) by captain normal on Monday September 22 2014, @03:37AM

          by captain normal (2205) on Monday September 22 2014, @03:37AM (#96580)

          Why should the editors waste time looking at (the slash code site that used to exist)? I surely don't, and haven't missed it one bit.

          --
          When life isn't going right, go left.
        • (Score: 2) by Blackmoore on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:40PM

          by Blackmoore (57) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @04:40PM (#97222) Journal

          buswolley

          I stopped visiting /. during the beta debockle I refuse to check another source for duplication.
          Hugh also submits to other sites. and occasionally more than one will agree to the submission.

          the real crime here was the pure plagiarism. and the top level article has been edited to reflect that.

          We have no issue with running an article that happen to show up on another site. that's what we do. and we arent going to try to tell submitters that it has to be exclusive to SN either. that wouldnt be Open.

          • (Score: 2) by buswolley on Tuesday September 23 2014, @05:05PM

            by buswolley (848) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @05:05PM (#97243)

            And I threw the first fuckBetabomb on /.

            --
            subicular junctures
            • (Score: 2) by Blackmoore on Tuesday September 23 2014, @05:41PM

              by Blackmoore (57) on Tuesday September 23 2014, @05:41PM (#97263) Journal

              so why bother with /. ?

              for me - i have a time crunch. i saw the quality of comments degrade and I have to cut back on the surfing.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 26 2014, @07:39PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 26 2014, @07:39PM (#98680)

            I don't expect you to check Slashdot for duplicated submissions, but perhaps Googling some chunks of supposedly original comment added by the submitter would work as a quick and dirty check for plagiarism.

  • (Score: 1) by mckwant on Monday September 22 2014, @01:37AM

    by mckwant (4541) on Monday September 22 2014, @01:37AM (#96536)

    Probably less common in the rarefied air that Apple can pay for, but I heard a similar story in business school. (Don't hate me, all I got out of it was debt.)

    Anyway, back when SoftSoap first came out, the story says there were only three or four factories that could make the spring-loaded tops. So, before they went to market, the CEO bought three years of production from those factories. This ensured their monopoly. The market caught up, of course, but they got a good run while it lasted.

  • (Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Monday September 22 2014, @02:45AM

    by M. Baranczak (1673) on Monday September 22 2014, @02:45AM (#96556)

    What happened when Apple wanted to CNC machine a million MacBook bodies a year? They bought 10k CNC machines to do it.

    So each of those machines only makes 100 MacBook bodies per year? It would be more efficient to hire 10,000 Cultural Anthropology majors and have them carve the MacBooks by hand. I'm guessing somebody misplaced a decimal point.