Apple told the White House that it will make an additional $500B of investments in the US, hoping in exchange for relief from President Trump's tariffs on goods imported from China. Those investments include:
- Hiring 20,000 new workers.
- Building a new server manufacturing facility in Houston to begin producing the servers that power the cloud component of Apple Intelligence in collaboration with Foxconn Technology Group.
- Expanding data center capacity in Arizona, Oregon, Iowa, Nevada and North Carolina, which are all states with existing Apple capacity.
- Opening a manufacturing academy in Detroit, where it will help smaller companies with manufacturing.
- Doubling its manufacturing fund in the US to $10B.
The disclosure comes days after Trump and Apple CEO Tim Cook met in the Oval Office. Following the meeting, Trump said that Apple was making the investment because of “faith in what we are doing.” However Apple didn’t clarify whether the newly announced investments were already underway before Trump’s tariffs were announced.
During Trump's first term, Cook successfully swayed him into exempting the iPhone from tariffs by arguing that the tax would serve to benefit competitors like Samsung. Apple also made multiple announcements during Trump's first term about US investments and credited Trump with Mac Pro manufacturing in Texas, even though the company had been doing so since 2013.
Apple is taking a similar strategy now with its announcement about satisfying Trump's agenda, even though the plans were likely on the cards no matter who took office.