In China’s Henan province, workers for Foxconn, a manufacturing company and major Apple supplier, are lining up to quit after seeing wage cuts of up to 25 per cent and losing perks like free laundry. In Foxconn’s 2018 prospectus, it said 20 per cent to 30 per cent of its current revenue is from a “well-known US brand,” assumed to be a reference to Apple. (South China Morning Post)

Talking point: The effects of Apple’s falling iPhone sales, announced in January, are rippling onto Foxconn workers in China. The cuts show Henan’s overreliance on Foxconn for exports, something Liu Zhe, who represents the province through China’s political advisory legislative body, pointed out. The province’s government deployed all of its available resources to get Foxconn to its capital city Zhangzhou, offering substantive tax subsidies in exchange. There are now reports that the Zhangzhou facility had received orders from Huawei, and would be recruiting 50,000 workers. The telecom giant had no comment. A decade ago, Huawei and Apple had roughly equal market share in China. Today, Huawei has 27 per cent to Apple’s nine per cent.