U.S. manufacturers look into Chinese factory suicides

Jake Widman
Thursday, 27 May 2010 05:26

IT Industry - Strategy

Responding to a recent spate of worker suicides at the Foxconn manufacturing plant, Apple, Dell, and HP have announced separate investigations into working conditions at the factory.

Foxconn's facility in Shenzhen, China, is one of the largest contract electronics manufacturing plants in the country, housing and employing 300,000 people.

Since the beginning of the year, nine workers have died from falling off buildings at the plant; police have called seven of them suicides. In addition, two other worker have tried to kill themselves by jumping off a building but survived.

As reported in Bloomberg Businessweek, three U.S. clients of Foxconn (also known as the Hon Hai Group) have vowed to investigate the deaths and working conditions at Foxconn.

Apple spokesperson Steve Dowling said his company is "saddened and upset by the recent suicides at Foxconn."

"A team from Apple is independently evaluating the steps they are taking to address these tragic events and we will continue our ongoing inspections of the facilities where our products are made," vowed Dowling.

For HP and Dell's actions, see Page 2.