Foxconn is the OEM for Apple’s iPhone, which I believe comes out of their Shenzhen factory. Over at MacRumors there is a report of a new iPhone being delivered with a few snapshots of a girl who is actually in the process of prepping one on the production line. If it is a legitimate report I am quite sure it was not intentional, but perhaps it should have been. Think of all those stickers on clothing and electronics you currently buy….

“Inspected by #131”
“Packed by #179”
“Built by #229”

Who are the people behind those numbers!!!

OEMs & ODMs have been silent partners of the worlds leading brands (Sony, Apple, Dell, etc.) and most consumers couldn’t care one bit. But what happens if you can make it personal…what happens if the person who makes my iPhone, Dell Laptop or Sony TV isn’t an anonymous cog in the wheel anymore. Perhaps it might change, even in the slightest way, how I feel about the product, brand and country of origin. It’s easy to hate a country, it’s hard to hate a specific person…especially one who has helped make such a great piece of hardware (like the iphone)! 

Think of it as a type of Über-CSR…providing the appearance of complete transparency. If you have two products of differing brands side-by-side, all else being equal, would you buy the one that is completely opaque about manufacturing conditions or the one that offers actual proof of the conditions under which it is manufactured? 

And if you buy the transparent brand, I could envision a self-correcting mechanism in the marketplace which would punish companies who tried to rig the system and reward those who were completely authentic in their representation. Among the array of positive & negative repercussions…it could bring a whole new level of supply-chain responsibility to both front-end brands and back-end manufacturers. 

Instead of “Intel Inside” it’s “Wu Luli Inside”