【2019年：苹果公司的美联航上海与旧金山的通勤之旅】想象一下，如果你是 2019 年苹果公司在美联航的客户经理，你的整个季度目标就是“让蒂姆·库克满意”。✈️🍎
关于你 iPhone 背后的供应链，以下是一些令人瞠目结舌的物流数据：
• 每天 50 个商务舱座位。在新冠疫情爆发前，苹果包下了美联航旧金山至上海航线商务舱的大部分座位。
• 每年 3500 万美元的通勤费用。苹果每年花费 3500 万美元，仅仅是用于将制造设计工程师、工艺工程师和运营经理从库比蒂诺送到中国监督生产。
• 要求整条航线。美联航在 2015 年开始每天运营旧金山至成都航线，因为苹果承诺包下该航线上几乎全部 36 个商务舱座位。为什么是成都？因为全球 50% 的 iPad 都产自那里。
• 美联航头号VIP客户。2019年，苹果公司仅在美联航的消费就高达约1.5亿美元，遥遥领先于其他航空公司，成为该航空公司最大的企业客户。
1997年，史蒂夫·乔布斯重启苹果在中国的生产布局，此后，苹果在中国的制造业发展成为一股强大的引擎，拥有富士康等合作伙伴的140万名员工，并在该地区实现了高达550亿美元的年度资本支出峰值。
下次当你打开崭新的苹果包装盒时，不妨想想：坐在3B座位上的工程师可能为了确保玻璃杯敲击得恰到好处，错过了孩子的钢琴演奏会。
灵感来源于帕特里克·麦基的《苹果在中国》Patrick McGee’s "Apple in China" 和王·丹的《飞速发展》 Dan Wang’s "Breakneck".。如果你想感受现代制造业规模带来的震撼，强烈推荐这两本书。
2019 Apple's United Airlines Commute
Imagine being the United Airlines account manager for Apple in 2019. Your entire quarterly target is literally just "Keep Tim Cook happy." ✈️🍎
A few mind-bending logistics facts about the supply chain behind your iPhone:• 50 Business Class seats. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. Pre-COVID, Apple bought out a massive chunk of United’s daily SFO → Shanghai business cabin.
• A $35,000,000 annual commute. That is what Apple spent just to fly Manufacturing Design Engineers, process engineers, and ops managers from Cupertino to supervise production in China.
• Demanding an entire route. United literally started flying SFO → Chengdu daily in 2015 because Apple promised to buy out almost all 36 business seats on every flight. Why Chengdu? That’s where 50% of the world's iPads are born.
• United's 1 VIP. In 2019, Apple was spending roughly $150 million a year with United alone, making them the airline's largest corporate customer by a mile.
When Steve Jobs restarted Apple’s China manufacturing push in 1997, it grew into an engine powered by 1.4 million workers at partners like Foxconn, backed by a peak $55 billion annual CAPEX in the region.
Next time you open a crisp new Apple box, remember: an engineer on seat 3B probably missed their kid's piano recital to make sure that glass tapped just right.
Inspired by Patrick McGee’s "Apple in China" & Dan Wang’s "Breakneck". Highly recommend both if you want your brain melted by modern manufacturing scale.
