Microsoft Manufacturing Surface Hub In the US

overThruster writes: According to the New York Times, Microsoft has chosen to manufacture its Surface Hub in Wilsonville, Oregon. The announcement follows Apple’s decision to build the Mac Pro in Texas. "It makes a lot of sense to manufacture in the U.S.," said Steve Hix, an entrepreneur who founded several Portland-area tech companies, including one that had a manufacturing facility in Wilsonville. "The key issue is quality."

Comments

In other words

[Anonymous Coward]

It's an ultra low volume product that has a very limited audience but looks cool to plebs. Since Chinese manufacturing requires a pretty high volume of sales to pay off, m$ gains good pr by keeping it on this side of the Pacific. Not impressed

Re:In other words

[Demonoid-Penguin]

Since Chinese manufacturing requires a pretty high volume of sales to pay off, m$ gains good pr by keeping it on this side of the Pacific. Not impressed

The key word is manufacture. Call me a cynic but I seriously doubt M$ is going to manufacture much in the US.

To the best of my knowledge only Japan, China and Korea have the plants to make most of the components and I can't find any evidence that there are plans to set up the facilities in the US.

It does seem that the screen itself (multiple 8x3' acrylic sheets with LED inserts around the edges) will be US made - so I guess that justifies the proposed "made in" label (and government funding?). From the referenced news (fluff) article (emphasis mine):-

The product is so unusual — representing one of the largest touch screens of its kind — that Microsoft could not find existing assembly lines in Asia to build it on, the company said.

One reason Microsoft’s factory is in Wilsonville, a city of about 21,000 about 20 minutes south of Portland, is that the Surface Hub originated at a start-up called Perceptive Pixel, which Microsoft acquired in 2012. The start-up had an assembly plant in Wilsonville for its giant touch-screen device

Although many components in the product will come from overseas, the Surface Hub will be stamped with the phrase “Manufactured in Portland, OR, USA.

And yeah - the "can't find existing Asian assembly lines big enough" is a bit of a deliberate furphy as assembly lines are built to suit the order - in this case they're just using the existing Perceptive Pixel assembly lines (which makes sense, as they bought the company which includes it's assets). Guess we'll wait and see. If it stays in the US it'll be interesting - especially seeing how they deal with the tax on the income.

Thanks Slashdot!

[kamapuaa]

Wow, some stuff is getting manufactured, in the nation with the largest manufacturing economy!

Re:Thanks Slashdot!

[ShanghaiBill]

Wow, some stuff is getting manufactured, in the nation with the largest manufacturing economy!

China surpassed the US as the world's largest manufacturer in 2010, and has continued to widen the lead.