[akiddoc]

Repatriating Apple build sites is a quixotic goal at this point. 

When high-tech manufacturing moved out of the US we didn't just move out the branded companies you know, we moved out their suppliers (sheet metal, ICs, Printed Circuit Boards, etc).  This also meant we lost the SUPPLIER'S suppliers (plastic molders, raw materials, resin/weave, platers, etc), the equipment makers used by the brand name factories (placement equipment, many semi-conductor equipment manufacturers, Optical inspection, etc), the tool making supporting all of the above (much faster turns and lower cost in China) and the skilled workers and education needed to support everything mentioned.

If Apple moved a factory back here, it would probably be small, focused on configure-to-order/high-end product and all their material and equipment would be shipped in from overseas.  I believe that is the model for their small Sacramento facility but some here might know better.

I was one of the lead automation engineers (Stanford Industrial Engineer who actually went into manufacturing!) on one of the very last high-end branded manufacturing sites in Santa Clara county.   By the end the cost of fighting the outsourcing trend was increasingly impossible (read high cost) for mass manufacturing.  All of our suppliers were now in China and our first step was to ship everything we needed here. 

Now I spend a lot of time working with Chinese companies that do what I used to do and have been into the Foxconn/HonHai Guangzhou/Shenzhen sites building all those iPhones (but not those particular buildings of course!).  The thirty-five year trend of moving manufacturing elsewhere will not turn around anytime soon.  In most cases now manufacturing is done in areas specializing in the specific niches and deeply engrained into the local support system (high volume IC manufacturing in Taiwan and several other spots, high volume, high end consumer electronics in coastal china, low volume/low cost manufacturing chases the lowest wage rate around the world, etc.

More realistic repatriation goals would be bulky/large items and new manufacturing tech items - basically products where shipping costs are high and we haven't given competitors a 35 year head-start.  Watch Tesla and see how they compete - they have both advantages.

Your job sounds eerily similar to that of one of my sisters. Large (LARGE) well known American company that builds products in China (not Apple, but she worked there for quite a while back in the Jobs I era). Industrial Engineering degree from Stanford. She was actually in China in January (against my advice). The design work is done in the USA.

[akiddoc]

Repatriating Apple build sites is a quixotic goal at this point. 

When high-tech manufacturing moved out of the US we didn't just move out the branded companies you know, we moved out their suppliers (sheet metal, ICs, Printed Circuit Boards, etc).  This also meant we lost the SUPPLIER'S suppliers (plastic molders, raw materials, resin/weave, platers, etc), the equipment makers used by the brand name factories (placement equipment, many semi-conductor equipment manufacturers, Optical inspection, etc), the tool making supporting all of the above (much faster turns and lower cost in China) and the skilled workers and education needed to support everything mentioned.

If Apple moved a factory back here, it would probably be small, focused on configure-to-order/high-end product and all their material and equipment would be shipped in from overseas.  I believe that is the model for their small Sacramento facility but some here might know better.

I was one of the lead automation engineers (Stanford Industrial Engineer who actually went into manufacturing!) on one of the very last high-end branded manufacturing sites in Santa Clara county.   By the end the cost of fighting the outsourcing trend was increasingly impossible (read high cost) for mass manufacturing.  All of our suppliers were now in China and our first step was to ship everything we needed here. 

Now I spend a lot of time working with Chinese companies that do what I used to do and have been into the Foxconn/HonHai Guangzhou/Shenzhen sites building all those iPhones (but not those particular buildings of course!).  The thirty-five year trend of moving manufacturing elsewhere will not turn around anytime soon.  In most cases now manufacturing is done in areas specializing in the specific niches and deeply engrained into the local support system (high volume IC manufacturing in Taiwan and several other spots, high volume, high end consumer electronics in coastal china, low volume/low cost manufacturing chases the lowest wage rate around the world, etc.

More realistic repatriation goals would be bulky/large items and new manufacturing tech items - basically products where shipping costs are high and we haven't given competitors a 35 year head-start.  Watch Tesla and see how they compete - they have both advantages.

Your job sounds eerily similar to that of one of my sisters. Large (LARGE) well known American company that builds products in China (not Apple, but she worked there for quite a while back in the Jobs I era). Industrial Engineering degree from Stanford. She was actually in China in January (against my advice). The design work is done in the USA.