According to the results of last year, the American corporation HP Inc took second place in the number of laptops and computers produced in the world, second only to the Chinese Lenovo, but in fact, the bulk of its products were assembled by contractors in China. The management of HP Inc considers such a geographic concentration of production in the current difficult geopolitical circumstances to be excessively dangerous, as reported by Nikkei Asian Reviewand therefore intends to move up to 70% of its laptop production outside of China within three years.
Image source: HP Inc.
For this purpose, HP Inc. contractors are already building additional plants and logistics centers in Thailand and Singapore, since both countries have been chosen as alternatives to China in terms of locating laptop production. It is noteworthy that HP Inc.’s product development center in Taiwan will only slightly weaken its role in the company’s business, having received additional specialists in Singapore. That is, in a potential conflict between Taiwan and China, the American manufacturer is consciously betting on the island protected by the authorities of its country.
There are other reasons for this migration. If Donald Trump comes to power in the US following the fall elections this year, he may well, for old times’ sake, launch a “trade war” with China by banning the import of certain types of products to the US. On the contrary, the same processors with AI acceleration functions may no longer be supplied to China from the US, and they will be required for the production of laptops. For this reason, HP Inc is also trying to place more production facilities outside of China.
