Financial Times – Apple investigates illegal student labour at Watch assembly plant
Apple has launched an investigation into its supply chain after a workers’ rights group alleged that one of its suppliers was illegally employing students in China to make Apple Watches.
The Silicon Valley giant opened the probe last week, after Sacom, a Hong Kong-based human rights group, alleged that Quanta Computer, a Taiwanese Apple supplier, has been illegally employing students to assemble Apple Watches in the Chinese city of Chongqing.
In response to the latest allegations about the Quanta factory in Chongqing, an Apple spokesperson said: “We are urgently investigating the report that student interns added in September are working overtime and night shifts. We have zero tolerance for failure to comply with our standards and we ensure swift action and appropriate remediation if we discover [supplier code] violations.”
Sacom said it had unearthed similar labour abuses at Quanta Chongqing in the production of Apple Watches in an earlier investigation. At the time, Apple denied Quanta’s Chongqing plant was a part of its supply chain.