Why The U.S. Fell Behind In Phone Manufacturing

Made in China. It’s a common phrase known by many. Cell phones, TV screens and game consoles are just some of the millions of electronics manufactured and imported from China to the U.S. daily. China has controlled the smartphone manufacturing market for years. While some industries, like the semiconductor industry and the EV battery market, are scrambling to build new factories across the U.S., tech giants like Apple and Google are not making the same effort to do that. CNBC explores why tech giants produce phones abroad and whether it makes sense to move production to America. And CNBC visits one company, Purism, at its Carlsbad, California factory to take a look inside the only smartphone manufacturing facility in the U.S. to learn what it takes to build phones in America. Produced by: Sydney Boyo Supervising Producer: Jeniece Pettitt Additional Camera: Andrew Evers, Katie Brigham Editorial Support: Katie Tarasov Graphics by: Josh Kalven Chapters: 0:00 Introduction 1:12 Big Tech favors China 6:00 Challenges of reshoring 11:39 Is America ready?