Foxconn founder Terry Gou urges Apple to move production out of China

Debby Wu for Bloomberg:

The billionaire founder of Apple Inc.’s largest supplier asked the U.S. company to move part of its sprawling production chain from China to neighboring Taiwan.
“I am urging Apple to move to Taiwan,” said Terry Gou, the largest shareholder in Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., answering a question about whether Apple will shift production away from China. “I think it is very possible,” he said without elaborating.
The Trump administration’s threat to levy tariffs on some $300 billion of Chinese-made goods — including phones and laptops — has inflamed speculation that Apple will divert some capacity away from the world’s second largest economy. And Hon Hai is the largest of hundreds of Apple-suppliers with factories on the mainland, making most of the world’s iPhones from the central Chinese city of Zhengzhou.
A significant shift of manufacturing from China to Taiwan — which Beijing views as part of its territory — may also exacerbate tensions between the two governments. Hon Hai, the main listed arm of the Foxconn Technology Group, is today the largest private employer in China…

MacDailyNews Take: Keep turning the screws and we’ll get a U.S.-China trade deal sooner than later.