Well said.I suspect this is the final nail in the coffin for SCM in China. I can bet you Apple is working hard behind the scenes to get out of China before the end of the decade. Its likely Tim’s one final act before he retires from Apple. He is being diplomatic about it and doing so cautiously as to not upset China. Also, a lot of the components required to assemble an iPhone are still being built there. Until the who SCM can be migrated to India and Vietnam, it will take a while. It makes sense too, China is actually becoming costly to do business not just because of the lock downs, but so many are now lifted out of poverty into middle class status. This leads to higher cost to hire workers to this kind of vocational skill. So, spreading some of that prosperity to India is indeed the right thing. Also, have a backup plan for India too. Africa has a very young population.
We can say many things about Tim Cook...
No Charisma as a leader, questionable choices with regards to development, disproportioned focus on new features rather than fixing software and messy lineups...
That said, we know he's a logistic genuis, and I 100% expect he's low-key moving the production outside china.