Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam – In industrial parks set among the rolling hills and tea fields of northern Vietnam, legions of factory workers are busy making products for leading tech giants such as Apple, Samsung, LG Electronics and Microsoft.
Already hundreds of thousands strong, their ranks are swelling fast.
Frustrated with China’s “zero-COVID” lockdowns halting production at a moment’s notice, manufacturers are seeking alternatives to the world’s biggest economy and No 1 manufacturing hub. Vietnam, with its cheap labour, geographic proximity to China and stable political environment, is a key beneficiary.
“For a lot of these companies, they withstood the trade war, they withstood rising labour costs in China, and then they withstood the breakdown of supply chains during COVID… [China’s] zero-COVID policy I think now is the straw that breaks the camel’s back,” Greg Poling, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told Al Jazeera.
“Vietnam is not the only place that multinationals are looking to diversify out of China, but Vietnam is probably the most successful.”
Apple, Google and Samsung are all pushing ahead with firsts in the Southeast Asian country.
Foxconn and Luxshare Precision Industry, two of Apple’s most important suppliers, are currently in talks to make Apple Watches and Macbooks in Vietnam for the first time. To support its Vietnam expansion, Taiwan-based Foxconn has…
