Google's Motorola Mobility to Close Texas Plant

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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Google’s Motorola Mobility division recently opened a manufacturing plant in Fort Worth, Texas. It was just announced that the plant would now be closing by the end of this year. The high cost of manufacturing in the US was cited as the main reason for the plant’s closure.

The plant-closing announcement comes four months after Google said it plans to sell the Motorola handset business to Chinese computer maker Lenovo Group Ltd. for $2.9 billion.
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"high cost of manufacturing in the US"

Translates to: "We found somewhere overseas to pay people less money to make our stuff".
 
Communist countries are good at keeping wages low as a part of national eco strategy. Its very odd to hear kids complaining about capitalism while condemning China's cheap wages at the same time
 
What the hell happened to "it only costs $3 more to make the dame phone in the US argument we got 6 months ago?!"
 
roma said:
Communist countries are good at keeping wages low as a part of national eco strategy. Its very odd to hear kids complaining about capitalism while condemning China's cheap wages at the same time
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China hasn't really been communist for a long time now.
 
Eventually the US will run out of jobs for 50% or more of the population. I can't wait for that period of time but too bad I won't be alive to see it. We'll see how many people complain about communism, socialism, capitalism, and whatever when they have to worry about the next meal. We might go to 3 day work weeks and job shifting just to keep enough of our workforce employed.
 
SGA76 said:
What the hell happened to "it only costs $3 more to make the dame phone in the US argument we got 6 months ago?!"
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Probably still true, they just aren't selling enough high end phones. And you don't want to pay Americans to make cheap phones since that just kills margin.

3700 to 0 employees in months is pretty poor planning.
 
Unions and regulations place wages and costs too far from a profitable point.

It's not happening in US of A only. In Brazil wages are not that high, but the taxes associated with them are, and in the end manufacturing here is not competitive at all. That and stupid regulations and bureaucracy makes a PITA to get anything done here. Better to buy it from somewhere else.
 
Seems like Google didn't really think this one through. I remember not long ago here in TX the Moto plant was all over the news, people happy to be making phones in 'Merica etc. Gone baby, gone.

I think if they stamped every Moto X phone's back cover with an etched MADE IN USA, MOTHERFUCKERS it would sell a whole lot more!
 
Dang, good thing I walked out of the interview. It was a multilayer contractor situation which to me looked like they wanted an easy way to pull the plug without having to "lay off" people. Motorola contracted the fan who I think was Flextronics. Flextronics then contracted out the work to a work force company. No way I was giving up my very secure semiconductor job for that fly by night place.
 
The difficulty with manufacturing in the USA is less about labor costs and more about material costs (and of course the low sales of their units played a factor) ... if they were selling their phones on the same scale as Apple and Samsung they could have made it work but for their USA marketplace their phones were not selling well (which defeats the need to manufacture here)
 
kbrickley said:
The difficulty with manufacturing in the USA is less about labor costs and more about material costs (and of course the low sales of their units played a factor) ... if they were selling their phones on the same scale as Apple and Samsung they could have made it work but for their USA marketplace their phones were not selling well (which defeats the need to manufacture here)
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To Apples credit they are able to manufactor the Mac Pro here in America. Bit of a price difference though.
 
Is anyone else going to buy the plant?

Doesn't the US government want communication equipment that's not made in China?
 
BladeVenom said:
Is anyone else going to buy the plant?

Doesn't the US government want communication equipment that's not made in China?
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Even if you manufacture in the USA most of the parts will still come from China (especially with electrical components) ... the software is owned by American companies Apple (iOS), Google (Android), and Microsoft (Windows Mobile) ... there aren't a lot of raw components manufactured in the USA as those sorts of low margin industries are usually the first to be outsourced
 
Ordinarily this would be a case of outsourcing as a tax dodge, but here with Lenovo it is worse, the Chinese don't want manufacturing to take hold back in the US, so move the new acquisition back to China.

This, as far as I'm concerned is A) why you don't allow the sale to Lenovo at all, and B) why you now retaliate and ban sales of ALL Lenovo products in the US.
 
^ Do you really need an answer to that?

Frankly we should stop whining about someone else doing a job good enough cheap enough if we don't even know how to vote for representatives who actually have our best interests in mind.
 
SGA76 said:
What the hell happened to "it only costs $3 more to make the dame phone in the US argument we got 6 months ago?!"
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The Chinese bought the division. 3 dollars is one workers day wage in China.
 
snowcrash said:
Eventually the US will run out of jobs for 50% or more of the population. I can't wait for that period of time but too bad I won't be alive to see it. We'll see how many people complain about communism, socialism, capitalism, and whatever when they have to worry about the next meal. We might go to 3 day work weeks and job shifting just to keep enough of our workforce employed.
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I'm sure the tinfoil companies will supply more than enough jobs for you to make hats with.
 
xX_Jack_Carver_Xx said:
Ordinarily this would be a case of outsourcing as a tax dodge, but here with Lenovo it is worse, the Chinese don't want manufacturing to take hold back in the US, so move the new acquisition back to China.

This, as far as I'm concerned is A) why you don't allow the sale to Lenovo at all, and B) why you now retaliate and ban sales of ALL Lenovo products in the US.
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We have recently switched from Dell machines to Lenovo machines at work.

Every since Lenovo I've unpacked to get setup comes with a nice little sticker with the American Flag on it with the words "Assembled in the USA".
 
Assembled in USA is better than just designed in the USA, man.
 
dvsman said:
Assembled in USA is better than just designed in the USA, man.
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Really? If you don't know how to design them, then when the assembly plant shuts down that's it no chance of a homegrown one.
 
I would think the closing would have something to do with Lenovo buying Motorola. I am tired of lenovo buying everything, most there laptops have the worst trackpads(Lenovo G580) cheap huntkey power supplies in their desktops(Lenovo E71) total garbage all around.
 
Stop and think about this a second.
The Bionic and Razer (Verizon) were supposed to get quad core chips, instead?
They got Texas Instruments OMAP dual core CPUs that were outdated when they were stuffed into the original Kindle.
Now the "flagships" on Sprint and Verizon are getting dual core Qaulcom CPUs and none have large screens.
There was no high end flagship phone.
There is no high end flagship phone.
There is just a name, "Droid" that made us think Android for the longest time. Now Motorola makes crappy underpowered phones that Samsung and LG blow out of the water. Hell man you're better off with a Nexus 4 or 5 than a Droid.
 
yea I am kind of pissed at the fast about face on this deal. I think Google bought motorola reviewed the books and said. "This is a money hole. Bail the eff out." so they did and sold it to China who can use prison grade labor to manufacture the product in bulk and dump it in third world markets in bulk.

Oh and play Eff the US some more.

Thank you google for laying of thousands of Texas employees. We really apprecaite it.
 
Grimlaking said:
yea I am kind of pissed at the fast about face on this deal. I think Google bought motorola reviewed the books and said. "This is a money hole. Bail the eff out." so they did and sold it to China who can use prison grade labor to manufacture the product in bulk and dump it in third world markets in bulk.
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Google got Motorola's patent portfolio, which is staying put right where it is now TYVM. All Lenovo is getting is the hardware division. In the end, Google got exactly what they wanted out of the deal.

I happen to have a Moto X, and it's a damn snappy phone. I love it. Almost pure Android, a few additional modifications that make it slightly more functional, and no cartoon-gasm interface that looks like a box of crayola melted all over the screen like what Samsung offers. I'd go the Nexus route if Verizon didn't have me by the balls for the next couple years.
 
In the near future it'll be more like "Closing a factory anywhere and everywhere due to the high cost of human labor"
 
icemunk said:
In the near future it'll be more like "Closing a factory anywhere and everywhere due to the high cost of human labor"
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Pretty much. Once manufacturing small devices is being better handled by robots, I think you will see more of it move back into this country as well...

"8,700 American Robots to Start Working a 7 Year Shift Assembling Widgets, Robot Overlords Pleased"
 
I think once 3d printing becomes more standard and available I can see America competing with others for manufacturing contracts.
 
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