December 1, 2022
Buyers of the iPhone 14 Pro should expect to wait, and wait some more, to get their hands on the device and other iPhones due to unrest at Foxconn, the world’s largest iPhone factory, which produces 70% of all iPhones worldwide, over China’s strict COVID restrictions and unfair payments.
Foxconn workers in COVID masks clashed with security personnel in white hazmat suits holding plastic shields in a rare instance of large-scale labor unrest in China. Some protesters used sticks to smash surveillance cameras and windows.
As a result of the COVID restrictions and protests, the Zhengzhou iPhone plant’s average utilization rate was only 20% in November. Protests have erupted at Foxconn’s Zhengzhou plant since the company’s lockdowns began last month, with workers smashing windows and surveillance cameras, demanding payment, and demanding better treatment of employees. Foxconn denied that the protests had any impact on production.
Foxconn also began moving COVID-positive workers to a vacant housing project without disclosing the infections and told workers to eat in their dormitories rather than company canteens, but then failed to separate infected workers from others.
The sources for this piece include an article in TheRegister.
