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In Samsung's Town in Vietnam, Workers Confident of Riding Out Note 7 Storm (reuters.com)
As Samsung Electronics struggles to salvage its reputation after the safety problems that have beset its flagship Galaxy Note 7 smartphone, the South Korean company can at least bank on an army of Vietnamese workers for support, Reuters report. From the article: Tens of thousands of them are involved in assembling more than a third of Samsung's smartphones -- the Galaxy Note 7 included -- in the Pho Yen area of Thai Nguyen province, which is about 65 km north of the Vietnamese capital Hanoi. Samsung's arrival three years ago transformed it from a sleepy farming district into a sprawling industrial town. While the company expects to take a profit hit of around $5 billion from the scrapping of the fire-prone phone, 13 workers interviewed by Reuters outside the factory almost all said they are confident their employer will pull through. They also say Samsung pays well, offers good benefits and takes care of their needs. "Recalling (Note 7) doesn't mean we are unemployed or such; Samsung also makes many other phones and new models, not just the Note 7," said Nguyen Thi Hang, one of some 110,000 Vietnamese who work for Samsung Electronics across Vietnam, making it one of the nation's biggest employers.
Note-aaa... seven.
So the town's explosive growth won't be harmed by all this?
Is it really any surprise that 13 employees who have only been with their employer for less than three years, all of which were a boom time for the employer, would have confidence in their employer? Let's see what they have to say this time next year after their employer has had to deal with a bust year. Sure, Samsung makes other phones that still need producing, but if your facility was the one lined up to make the Note 7 while the rest of the facilities already cover production for the other phones, guess which facility gets voted "Most Likely to Be Shut Down"?
How long until the headline reads "Samsung's Vietnamese workers caught by surprise at entirely predictable announcement of layoffs"?
Is someone concerned that gadget buyers are going so stop sorting by price and buying the cheapest one? Until Vietnam employs enough people to create wage pressure they don't have a damn thing to worry about. Exploding batteries, shredding tires, contaminated food... none of that has ever impacted Chinese trade with the west. Can't imagine why Vietnam should worry about that all.
Once Hillary pencil-whips TPP through however that could change; there are other disposable Asians that will breath aluminum dust 12 hours a day for even fewer pennies. That's what they really need to worry about.
Lovely little world we have here.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
I don't see why not.
Not sure why Reuters had to go there to ask that question...
For those who don't know the size of Samsung, the company could completely shut down and stop making phones altogether, it'd still wouldn't go down.
They have their hands on everything from domestic appliances, to major eletronics like TVs, corporate stuff like printers, a huge part of the electronics industry is dependant on component production from Samsung, a huge part of OLED panels are made by them, and they have clients like Apple, Dell, Sony and HP.
The company will definitely survive. What these workers should be worried though is about reestructuring and factories getting closed down, with mass downsizing.
Highly dependant on Samsung discovering what the culprit for the Note 7 is. My best guesses are going for either battery manufacturing, or software design...
Regardless though, the damage is already done. Best case scenario, people who bought Note 7 will mostly buy Galaxy S7s, so switch in production, and plans for Note 8 (or whatever comes next) starts right away. It's still an entire line of phones that won't be made anymore, tons of R&D losses, and whatnot. Well, that is unless Samsung is bold enough to make another version of the Note 7 and try to go with it... but it won't sell like the original would.
Worst case scenario, people who bought Note 7 migrates to other brands or platforms, the culprit in defect is something that demands full redesign for the product and the industrial process, Note line is discarded to start from scratch, and the next models from the company gets delayed to solve issues. Then you could have a scenario with tons and tons of people getting fired, entire factories closing down and whatnot.
to salvage their reputation, but the "Buy American" fascists and propagandists are working hard to put out that message. Samsung are going beyond their obligations to show that they're willing to fix the situation, which is more than can be said about certain other companies in the same market.
Remember that this is a case of less than 100 reported smoking batteries out of 2.5 million shipped, some of which have been proven to be lies and band-wagoning. Only American media and other dishonest people are trying to convince you that you will lose your home and health if you touch the phone.
I guess Note7 burns not as bad as napalm
You know, in all the reporting of the Samsung Note 7 *FAIL* I hadn't considered the effects on the production chain for this first-world phone. I hadn't read the story. Hadn't overheard it in conversation. It's not on TV. If I was more paranoid than usual, I might be concerned that the "sprawling industrial town" in the Pho Yen area might be some kind of planned "illuminati" grand experiment in economics. I'm really not that paranoid. Honest
Samsung has its own town? This is incredibly disturbing.
Surviving employees are confident that enough people were literally fired and that a layoff is unnecessary.
My understanding is that when you outsource to China for cheap tech assembly labor, Vietnam is so cheap that Chinese companies will turn around and send that labor to Vietnam. Or so I read on a Slashdot article some years ago.
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When you worship the God of Designed Obsolescence these things don't worry you too much. The G7 was this year's phone, there will be another phone in 3 months and another one a few weeks later.
Maybe this was just a failure to communicate in the planned obsolescence of the Note 7...
"Damn it Larry! Where's Larry? Damn! Some one tell Larry he's fired! The phones were supposed to catch fire during the initial release of the note 8!"