Apple CEO Tim Cook and more than 20 other chief execs met China’s premier today to discuss potential trade disruption once Trump takes office in January.
However, the report makes it sound like the meeting didn’t achieve much, with some saying it felt scripted and didn’t discuss specific plans …
The threat to Apple
Apple is of course highly dependent on China as a manufacturing center, with an estimated 80% of the world’s iPhones made in a single plant in the country. Any trade conflict between the US and China could have serious consequences for the Cupertino company.
During the last Trump presidency, import tariffs were imposed on a large number of goods imported from China – which included products made in China for US companies. Cook was successful in communicating to Trump the damage these tariffs could do to Apple and other American companies, and plans were changed to exclude most hi-tech products, including the iPhone.
However, Trump is again threatening to impose even more tariffs on Chinese-made goods, which could potentially include Apple products, and it’s not yet known whether
Tim Cook and other CEOs meet Chinese premier
Bloomberg reports that Cook was one of more than 20 CEOs to meet with Li Qiang to discuss the threat.
Cook, who’s visiting the country for at least the third time this year, joined top executives of global firms including Rio Tinto Plc, Corning Inc. and Charoen Pokphand Group in a meeting with Li Qiang, state media reported. Chinese corporate chiefs including the heads of Lenovo Group and ICBC also attended the event, which discussed supply chain and trade issues.
The meeting, in which about two dozen executives took part, marked the first high-level meeting between foreign corporations and a senior Beijing official since Donald Trump won a second four-year term. Companies worldwide are bracing for the president-elect’s threat to hike tariffs on Chinese goods.
However, the report suggests little may have been achieved.
It went on for over an hour and felt pretty scripted, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing a private event. Li, at one point, quoted Adam Smith’s view that the propensity to truck, barter and exchange was inherent in human nature, the people said.
Li also told the executives to send any feedback to him, saying he would take it seriously, one of the people said.
Cook said afterwards that Apple valued China very highly, and “could not do what we do without them [Chinese partners].”
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