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The Chinese city of Zhengzhou – known locally as iPhone City because it is home to the world's largest iPhone factory – has been sent into lockdown with immediate effect following a COVID-19 outbreak.
The new lockdown in Zhengzhou has a direct impact on the production of the iPhone 13 and is also affecting Apple's preparations for the later assembly of the iPhone 14. Zhengzhou has so far been spared from the lockdowns. Apple recently asked Foxconn to hire more iPhone workers to compensate for the loss of production capacity in other parts of the country. The South China Morning Post (SCMP) reportedthat the city of Zhengzhou was immediately locked down after a small COVID outbreak.
iPhone City: Zhengzhou goes into lockdown
Zhengzhou, which reported four new COVID-19 cases and 10 new asymptomatic carriers on Wednesday, will be under lockdown from Wednesday until next Tuesday. During this period, employees of government organizations and companies in the city's key districts will work from home, school classes will be moved online, and people will only be allowed to enter and leave Zhengzhou under "necessary" circumstances. Foxconn, the world's largest electronics contract manufacturer and a key supplier to Apple, imposed a hiring freeze for assembly line workers on Wednesday, several recruitment agencies in Zhengzhou, the capital of the central province of Henan, announced on social media.
A week-long citywide lockdown may seem like a massive overreaction to just 14 cases. Yet China continues to insist that it can completely eradicate the virus from the country with such radical measures. Although the number of cases is very low and the lockdown lasts only a week, this is an extremely worrying development for Apple. iPhone production has already been affected by shutdowns in other cities. But Apple has taken comfort in the fact that the world's largest iPhone factory was not affected. Foxconn even has backup production lines there specifically designed to absorb production losses when other parts of China are locked down. Even a short-term shutdown will have a significant impact. But the far more worrying prospect is that once the infection takes hold in the city, there will be further or sustained outbreaks, further stalling iPhone manufacturing. (Photo by bspguy / Bigstockphoto)
