General Discussion

Motorola tried building phones here and failed in Fort Worth Texas in 2008 and it failed with Flex doing the actual build. Flex is tax registered in Singapore but all executive management is in the US and is second only to Foxconn in terms of size. The Flex Austin site is world class but the products it builds are more complicated electronically but the volume is hundreds rather than millions per year. There is a huge step function between these two manufacturing operations and modes. Sites that build cellphones have 200,000 workers living in dorms and working 7 days a week and are paid (fully burdened) $5-$7 per hour with OT at time and a half.

The reason it will not work is the complexities, volume, cost, logistics and manufacturing skill are not here or aligned. Electronically, the US has never produced complex high volume electronics. China has been doing so since the early 90s. To copy exact it would take rewriting the labor and environmental laws. No $15 an hour. So you may ask can Mexico do it. No all for the same reasons. We have study and tried this many times and it fails because China is so damn good at it.