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Apple to Source Billions of US-Made Chips in Supply Chain Shift

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(Bloomberg) — Apple (AAPL) plans to source more than 19 billion chips from the US this year, part of a global supply chain shift to gradually lessen its reliance on China and elevate India for iPhone production.

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Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook talked about leaning more heavily on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSM) , which is expanding its Arizona operations to half a dozen plants.

He also affirmed expectations that Apple will in future make the vast majority of its US-bound iPhones in India — reducing output from China as the Donald Trump administration threatens to slap punitive tariffs on its Asian rival. India was mentioned almost as many times as China on Thursday’s post-earnings conference call, reflecting its rising importance.

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Cook however was mum on a series of questions about how potential tariffs on consumer electronics may affect Apple’s business, saying “it’s very difficult to predict beyond June.” Chief Financial Officer Kevan Parekh said Apple’s commentary on the call assumes that current global tariff rates and policies remain in effect and that the global macroeconomic outlook doesn’t worsen.

The Cupertino, California-based company’s much-awaited quarterly earnings report failed to soothe investor concerns about its biggest challenges, including escalating tariff costs and a slowdown in China. The company’s shares declined as much as 4.2% in late trading Thursday after Apple released second-quarter results that included worse-than-expected sales in China.

Apple has accelerated its manufacturing expansion in India, which is both rising as a market — at a time when Apple’s China sales keep declining — and is likely to be a more politically favored US trade partner over the long run. Apple already makes 20%, or one in five, of its iPhones in the South Asian country. It expects to import most of the iPhones for the US from India by the end of next year.

“We have a complex supply chain, there’s always risk in the supply chain,” Cook told analysts on the call. “What we learned some time ago was that having everything in one location had too much risk with it and so we have, over time, with certain parts of the supply chain, not the whole thing, but certain parts of it, opened up new sources of supply.”