富士康工人:身在廠內,心在外

Can Foxconn, the world’s largest contract manufacturer, keep growing and improve its margins now that cheap and willing hands are scarce?

如今又廉價又聽話的勞動力可謂鳳毛菱角，富士康這個全球最大的合約製造商，能否一直保持增長的態勢？

TO GET some idea of the scale of Foxconn’s Longhua campus in Shenzhen, in southern China, a visit to its massive central kitchens is all that is needed. They lie at the heart of this sprawling complex of factories, dormitories, sports facilities, banks and stores built by the secretive Taiwanese-owned firm. The food-preparation centre, spread over 12,500 square metres on four storeys, goes through three tonnes of meat a day as it prepares grub with military precision.

想知道深圳龍華富士康的規模，去它面積龐大的中心食堂看看足矣。這家神祕的臺資公司是由許多廠房、宿舍、運動場、銀行還有商場等不斷擴展的綜合設施構成，食堂在正中心，佔地12.5萬平方米，四層樓，每天要消耗3噸肉，他們準備食物的強度簡直可以和軍隊一較高下。

The enormous scale is to be expected, given that Foxconn (also known by its parent company’s name, Hon Hai) is the world’s largest contract manufacturer. The Longhua campus, covering 2.5 square kilometres, employs 240,000 people. Across China, it employs 1.4m on 28 campuses . Nor, given the firm’s prowess at churning out gazillions of gadgets like Apple’s iPhones, does the kitchen’s efficiency come as a surprise. Tens of thousands on each shift pay for meals swiftly by swiping cash cards loaded with 400 yuan ($64) a month in food credits.

規模如此龐大也是必然，畢竟富士康是世界最大的合約製造商，也因母公司鴻海而名聞天下。佔地2.5平方公里的龍華富士康擁有24萬員工。它在中國有28個工廠，員工總數高達140萬。再想想，既然它能生產出數目驚人的配件，比如爲iphone生產，那它廚房效率之高也就不足爲奇了。每一個班次有成千上萬人刷刷刷的迅速刷卡打飯，每個月每張飯卡里都會有400元。

The only things more impressive than the size of the canteen’s woks—more than 1 metre wide—are the firm’s spectacular growth and outsized ambitions. In the past decade it has gone from being one of many invisible firms in the electronics supply chain to the world champion of flexible manufacturing. Barclays, a bank, forecasts that the company’s revenues will exceed NT$3.9 trillion ($134 billion) this year.

比食堂的鍋——寬達1米——更讓人印象深刻是公司迅速的擴張還有它的雄心壯志了。在過去的十年裏，它已經從許多默默無聞的電子設備供應商中脫穎而出，奪得了彈性製造的桂冠。巴克萊銀行（Barclays）預計今年富士康的總收入將會超過3.9萬億新臺幣。

Foxconn is investing heavily to expand in the interior of China. By the end of this year its newish facilities in Zhengzhou, in Henan province, will employ more workers than the Longhua campus. It is also expanding in Brazil and Mexico. There are rumours it might even open a factory in America, since Apple, its biggest customer, has just declared that it plans to have some of its Mac computers made at home. Rich-world companies looking to follow suit, “reshoring” jobs back home, are struggling to find enough skilled manufacturing workers; Foxconn could apply to Americans its extensive experience of training Chinese workers from scratch. It admits it is “exploring the opportunity”.

富士康公司在拓展中國內陸市場上投入巨資。今年年底它在河南鄭州的新工廠招用的工人數量要比龍華工廠的還要多。於此同時，富士康在巴西和墨西哥的拓展工作也在如火如荼的進行着。作爲富士康最大的客戶蘋果剛剛宣佈計劃將在美國本地生產Mac，就有傳言稱富士康可能在美國開一家工廠。發達國家的公司似乎紛紛效仿蘋果想將產業“遷回本國”，卻爲尋找足夠的技術製造工而愁眉不展；在訓練“從零開始”的中國工人上，富士康有豐富的經驗可以提供給美國。它承認是在“尋求機遇”。

More strikingly, Foxconn believes it can double in size yet again. Executives talk of becoming one of the world’s top 20 businesses. This is no fantasy: Barclays foresees Foxconn’s revenues growing by 15-20% a year in the coming three years. There are two main obstacles to sustaining such growth: finding and retaining good workers in China, and improving the firm’s anaemic profit margins. Both problems will only be aggravated by growth.

更引人注目的是，富士康堅信他們的工廠規模還能翻一倍。公司高管們談論着如何躋身全球20強，這絕非癡人妄想：巴克萊預計在未來的3年裏，富士康的總收入將以每年15%—20%的速度增長。實現這一持續增長的目標有兩大阻礙：在中國尋找、留住優秀的員工；增加公司利潤。而增長只會使問題惡化。

As good employees become scarcer, Foxconn is having to pay more attention to working conditions—an issue on which it has attracted much unwelcome publicity. A lunchtime visit to the Longhua campus suggests that nowadays life there is not so bad. Off-duty workers smoke and fiddle with their mobile phones on the kerb outside the production halls, snooze on the campus’s football pitch or sit crocheting together in their dorms. Employees on an assembly line making corporate IT equipment look bored senseless but the facilities are orderly and spotless—a far cry from South Asian firetraps.

優秀僱員越來越難得，因此富士康不得不着力改善工作環境——這一問題曾招來衆人關注。午飯時間在龍華富士康轉一圈，發現現在那裏的生活也沒多糟。下了班的工人有的坐在廠房外的道沿兒上一邊抽菸一邊玩手機，有的坐在運動場上打瞌睡，還有的在宿舍打毛衣。一條裝配線上的工人，一齊裝配IT設備，看起來乏味無聊，但廠房卻井然有序，一塵不染，與南亞那些易着火的廠房截然不同。

When your correspondent requested an unscheduled visit to an assembly-line workers’ dormitory, officials immediately obliged and remained outside the dorm’s entrance. The women inside, who bunk eight to a room in basic but decent conditions, were unafraid and in good humour. People on campus dress in casual clothes, not company uniforms, and seem only about as discontented as the youth found in any Chinese city. Look closer, though, and you notice something jarring: enormous safety nets hung on many buildings to prevent suicide jumpers.

當我們記者突然要求隨機走訪裝配線工人的宿舍時，富士康的管理人員立即同意並一直在宿舍門外等待。宿舍裏有八張牀，條件雖然簡單但也算一應俱全，房內的女工人一點都不怯生，還十分幽默。廠內的工人穿的不是廠服，而是舒適的衣服，雖然面帶不滿，卻與城裏的年輕人沒什麼不一樣。可是，走近一看，卻能看到與周圍不相符的裝備：巨大的安全網懸掛在樓外，防止有人跳樓自殺。

That hints at Foxconn’s biggest challenge: demography. No longer can the firm rely on a steady supply of migrant workers grateful for any escape from grinding rural poverty. The country is rapidly ageing, and the pool of hungry young workers is shrinking. Besides expecting ever better pay and conditions, today’s new recruits want more fulfilling lives than those their predecessors put up with.

這卻暗示了富士康最大的挑戰：人口結構。從前，爲了擺脫貧困，只要給農民工提供工作，他們就心存感激，忠心耿耿，現在卻再也看不到了。中國正在迅速老齡化，又飢又窮的年輕勞動力正在縮減。如今的新進員工期望更加優厚的薪酬以及更加優越的環境，比起他們的前輩來說，他們希望更多的滿足自己的需求，而不是默默忍受。

Until recently Foxconn was unyielding in its discipline and working practices. But two years ago a spate of suicides led to a global outcry that shook the firm. Since then, several outbreaks of worker unrest and noisy campaigns by activists have further blackened its name. In response, Apple requested that the Fair Labour Association (FLA), an American watchdog, audit its suppliers. A report issued by that group in March found that although Foxconn’s facilities were “no worse than any factory in China” there were violations of the FLA’s code of conduct.

直到最近富士康才堅守企業規章和職業操守。兩年前，連續不斷的自殺事件讓公司震驚，在全世界也引起一片譁然。從那時起，爆發了數起工人動亂，讓富士康的名聲更臭了。蘋果公司更是要求美國監督部門美國平等勞動協會（FLA）對富士康進行調查。FLA於3月份公佈的一份調查顯示，儘管富士康企業“和許多中國企業一樣糟”，但是確實多處存在違反FLA規定的情況。

Peter Deng, a manufacturing director at the firm, recalls that a decade ago Foxconn gave only one or two days off per month and there was no limit on overtime—“and the workers didn’t mind.” Now, the firm claims to limit overtime and to insist that workers take a day off every week. It is also increasing wages and, after scandals, limiting the use of interns (about 2.7% of its workforce). In August the FLA said that Foxconn was “ahead of schedule” in improving conditions.

富士康公司製造主管Peter Deng回憶說，十年前，富士康每月只准休息一至兩天，加班倒是沒有時限——“工人都不在意”。可是現在，公司要求限制加班，而且堅持每週給工人放一天假。在連環跳樓事件和其他醜聞爆出後，富士康給工人們加了工資，限制實習生人數（約佔總勞力的2.7%）。八月，FLA說富士康在改善條件方面做得很好，“遠遠超出計劃”。

Fine, but if Foxconn wants to keep booming, it must do far more. The canteen visit hints at three ways it plans to improve workers’ lives.

富士康做的不錯，但它要想一直保持繁榮，要改善的還有很多。經過這次食堂訪問可以看出改善員工生活的方法主要有一下三條。

First, automation. It takes just three people to prepare the eight tonnes of rice consumed at lunch. The assembly lines are next. Terry Guo, the company’s flamboyant chairman, has vowed to build “one million robots” in an effort to eliminate mind-numbing tasks and move towards fully automated plants. The challenge is that tastes change quickly in consumer electronics. By the time bespoke robot kit is ready to automate a given factory line, the product mix has changed, making it obsolete. Scepticism is warranted, but insiders believe the firm is just a year away from breakthroughs that work at scale on commercial lines. Such “Foxbots”, and related services, could even be sold to other firms.

第一：自動化。準備午飯要吃的八頓米飯，僅僅需要三人。下一步是裝備線。如明星般耀眼的總裁郭臺銘（Terry Guo）立下誓言，說要造“100臺機器人”，減少乏味的工作，最終達到建設完全自動化的工廠。這一想法的困難在消費者對於電子產品的需求變化太快。待到裝配線上的工人全都變成自動化的機器人時，產品結構又會發生改變，這些機器人就報廢了。定會有人對此保持懷疑，但內部人士相信，公司要不了一年就會在商業裝配線上做出突破。這些“富士康機器人”以及相關服務甚至可以賣給其他公司。

Second, a bit of freedom. Workers can now skip the canteen, instead swiping meal cards at food courts on campus or going off campus to eat. They also now get a housing allowance, letting them choose between staying in dorms or (as 70% now do in Shenzhen) living off campus. There is more of a social life, too: a young employee, recently arrived from remote Xianyang, talks blushingly about her evenings with handsome co-workers at the Cyberfox, the campus internet café.

第二：更加自由。如今工人們可以不在公司食堂裏吃飯，在食堂周邊的小吃區同樣可以刷卡消費，或者還可以去工廠外吃飯。現在他們也能領到住房津貼，可以住宿舍（在深圳70%都在宿舍）還可以住在廠外。社交生活也豐富了許多：一位新來的咸陽工人，紅着臉訴說着在工廠網吧Cyberfox和帥氣的同事聊天的夜晚。

Third, outsourcing. The dorms, catering, security and much else at Longhua are now run by outsiders. Louis Woo, special adviser to Mr Guo, insists this is not to save money but to improve workers’ quality of life: “they simply do a better job than us.”

第三：外包。龍華富士康的宿舍、食堂、保安等都由第三方運作。胡國輝（Louis Woo），郭臺銘的特別顧問，稱他們不是在節約成本，而是改善員工生活質量，“這方面他們做的比我們好。”

Foxconn’s net margin has already fallen from above 6% a decade ago to around 2% now. It risks being squeezed further as the firm splashes out to attract and retain new workers. The trouble is, Foxconn is stuck in the hyper-competitive middle of the electronics supply chain. Upstream, the designers of components make enormous margins, as do the firms downstream that market the finished products. But midstream gadget assemblers do not. In China, it costs Apple a few dollars to have an iPod assembled, which it then sells for $299.

富士康的淨利率已從十年前的6%多跌至現在只有2%左右。公司花費巨資吸引並留住新員工，這就可能會有更低淨利率的風險。問題在於，富士康卡在高速競爭的電子供應的中間環節。上游是部件設計商，他們能獲得豐富的利潤；下游是成品銷售商，同樣獲利頗豐。只有想富士康這種配件裝配的中間商沒有多少利潤可言。在中國，蘋果僅需幾美元就能裝配一臺ipod，但售價卻高達299美元。

Could Foxconn’s push towards cheaper inland provinces boost margins? Not for long. Because of tax holidays granted to its new plants, the firm’s effective tax rate will drop from 25% in 2011 to 16-18% this year. But the gains will soon be eroded by higher inventory and logistics costs (because of the more remote locations), rising pay and fading subsidies. Within a few years, argues Alberto Moel of Sanford C. Bernstein, an investment bank, the shift will bring “no net benefit to gross margins.”

富士康能像中部省份進軍尋求高利潤嗎？可以，但不是長久之計。富士康的新廠雖在免稅期，富士康的有效稅率將從2011年的25%降低至今年的16%-18%。但是由於增長的庫存和物流成本（因爲工廠低處偏遠）、工資增長、補貼減少，獲利很快會被蠶食一空。投資銀行Sanford C. Bernstein的Alberto Moel認爲，不出幾年“基本不會盈利”。

Dull work, but not dangerous

工作雖無聊，但是很安全

Still, Mr Guo does have a strategy for increasing margins. First, he is moving upstream. In March he announced plans to buy a stake in Sharp, a troubled Japanese technology firm, and to help finance Sharp’s glass-panel research. (When Sharp’s shares later plunged, he waffled when asked to reconfirm the stake-buying.) Already, almost everything Foxconn makes has glass display screens—and this week it was reported to be working with Apple and Sharp on a new range of high-definition televisions. Foxconn wants to learn how to make screens better and cheaper. By using its manufacturing savvy to scale up any breakthroughs, it plans to boost Sharp’s sales—pocketing a share of the gains. Other such deals are likely.

即便如此，郭臺銘還是在增加利潤上有其戰略。首先，他正躋身上游。三月，他宣佈計劃購買身處困境的日本技術公司夏普（Sharp）的股份，資助夏普對平板產品的研發。（後來夏普的股票暴跌，當被問及是否確定購買夏普股份時，郭臺銘閃爍其詞。）富士康產品的屏幕幾乎無一例外都是玻璃的，本週就有報道披露，它將會與蘋果和夏普一道研製新一代高清電視。富士康想知道如何製造物美價廉的屏幕。憑藉自己在製造業的經驗，進行新突破，幫助夏普增加銷量——從其獲益中分得一杯羹。富士康還會進行類似的交易。

Mr Guo is also pushing downstream into retailing. He does not want Foxconn to create its own consumer brands; the idea is to use the firm’s supply-chain muscle to help its branded customers promote their products, by guaranteeing retailers that they will get their supplies on time and on demand. To help with this, it has taken stakes in several retail chains in China, including the local operations of Media Markt, a German electronics seller.

同樣，郭臺銘也在潛到下游的銷售業。他並不希望打造屬於富士康自己的消費品牌，而是希望利用富士康強大的供應鏈，通過向銷售商保證可以按時按需完成供應，幫助品牌消費產品提高銷量。爲了實現這一目標，郭臺銘投資了幾家中國的連鎖店，包括德國電子設備經銷商萬得城電器（Media Markt）。

Foxconn says branded manufacturers, especially Western ones with poor penetration in smaller Chinese cities, will benefit from its promotion of their products, shops will be able to hold lower inventories and consumers will enjoy lower prices. Analysts are doubtful. But if this takes off over the next five years, the firm also plans to tighten its links further with retailers by letting them tap directly into Foxconn’s internal e-commerce portal.

富士康說，他們不僅可以幫助那些名牌製造商（特別是對於外國的名牌產品卻在中國的二三線城市佔有份額較小）提高銷量，使之從中獲益；能幫助商店獲得較低的存貨支出；還能讓消費者享有較低的價格。分析家對此表示懷疑，可是一旦這一計劃在未來五年裏付諸行動，富士康還計劃加強與經銷商的關係，將它們直接納入富士康內部電子商務平臺。

These moves may pay dividends in the long term. But Mr Moel argues that quicker returns are to be found in the company’s core manufacturing operations, for instance by making more parts in-house. Foxconn is increasingly making components such as batteries, lenses, speakers and touch panels. It has scope to improve the efficiency of its production lines, especially on new campuses purpose-built for automation. The firm could also try demanding higher prices. There are signs that it is ready to move away from a low-price strategy, instead stressing reliability and high-volume capabilities.

從長遠看來， 這些舉措可能會給企業帶來盈利。但Moel認爲富士康的核心製造會進行更快的轉變，比如生產過多部件。富士康正在越來越多的生產諸如電池、鏡頭、揚聲器以及觸摸板之類的部件。不但如此，它們還在提升生產線的效率，特別是在那些爲了自動化生產而建造的新工廠。同時，富士康還可能太高價格。種種跡象表明它已經準備好了從廉價戰略轉向高可靠性和大批量生產力戰略。

Can Foxconn really persuade Apple, the world’s most powerful electronics firm, to cough up more money? That risks alienating a customer that accounts for 40-45% of its revenues. But as the world’s largest outsourced manufacturer grows even bigger, it is becoming ever more indispensable to Apple as well. In the end, that is the best thing Foxconn has cooking.

富士康真的有能力讓全球最大電子商蘋果公司願意支付出資更多嗎？這樣做有可能會讓蘋果公司不再選擇富士康，可是富士康總收入的40%—45%均來自蘋果。隨着全球最大的外包製造商越來越壯大，富士康對蘋果來說也是越來越重要。所以，說服蘋果公司加價纔是富士康心中所想。