Boo-hoo. We got a ton of pub from Apple but couldn't deliver. It was all a sham to throw off ScamsCum anyway...
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GT Seeks to Void 'Oppressive and Burdensome' Agreements With Apple, Outlines Sapphire Wind Down Process
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Exactly. It's not like they didn't know what they were getting themselves into. That's why they call it an "agreement".
Seems like they couldn't supply Apple with an ample supply of sapphire for the iPhone 6/6+ and are now in a financial bind and the only thing left to do is the easy part.......make Apple the villain.
I'd be surprised if the Court sides much with a company that "swings for the fence". More than likely, the Court will offer Chapter 11 protection to a much smaller, core business, with the remaining assets sold or converted ownership to satisfy lien holders, creditors, and investors.
I suspect Apple *wanted* to use them for the iPhone 6 but they couldn't meet the commitments and Apple couldn't afford to have mass production issues with their flagship phone, nor wanted to limit the sapphire to "high end models" etc. When they decided to go to Gorilla Glass, GT found themselves with a bunch of sapphire and a huge plant with no one to sell to. They needed to deliver and couldn't. Waiting a year for the next iPhone for GT to make use of their big and expensive plant may not be feasible.
How is this "milking" Apple?
Apple won't buy their product. Their contract states no one else is allowed to buy it. What else would you have them do?
Or, you could interpret this as Apple putting all of the risk on the supplier with burdensome contractual obligations to limit the upside.
If they meet the obligations and Apple feels like buying their stuff, they get to sell their wares to Apple and pay off the loan. And in 6 (or whatever) years, they're free to sell to whomever else they want to.
If they don't meet the obligations, or Apple has a bout of pique, or the stars aren't in alignment, or Tim Cook is having a bad day, they're completely screwed, Apple doesn't pay, and they're left with a bunch of equipment they're supposed to pay off with no product they can sell to do so.
The problem isn't in China. Problem is in the US and the company needs 75 plus US employees to wind down the company and sell the assets.
Where are all the people that say always say.. bring back the jobs to the US. Well here it is.. they will sue you when they mess up on a signed agreement.
This sounds about right.
As an aside, didn't I read somewhere earlier this year about Apple building their *own* sapphire production facilities? Is it possible they juiced up GT prior to that announcement, then moved to in house production, either because GT couldn't make their deliverables, or Apple decided it was cheaper to DIY, leaving GT holding the bag?
Opps. Not sue, what I meant was being a bitter company and breaking the contract terms in bad faith while bad mouthing their client.
That has nothing to do manufacturing in the United States. I'm not sure where the production problems are occurring, but from the rumours it sounds like it's in China from third party vendors.
The problem does not sound like US manufacturing but rather US management. If Apple iPhones are having manufacturing problems, the cause is not US manufacturing. The sapphire boules are made in the United States like many intel cpu's are made in the US. If a third party messes up the processing or integration of the American product, it not the fault of US manufacturing.
Even if GT was responsible for the sourcing of the third party it would still not be the fault of US manufacturing but rather US management.
Much more information is needed before we get the entire story. But if the sapphire boules that GT made were up to spec I do not see this as a negative for US industry. If Anything it could be a positive as the Chinese were the bottleneck.
I think too many people are jumping the gun with this, lets just wait for the entire story. Once we have that, you could be correct.
Yes, the number according to this https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1797685/ was $160 THOUSAND. If it was million, it would be a very different picture. But $160K is almost nothing in CEO lifestyle money.
I also run a business. I enter into client engagements that I never see as "burdensome" or "oppressive" going in. But sometimes they can become that based on how the engagement evolves.
I have no clue what happened here. But I know if my company was somewhat locked into an exclusive with a big company and I had a lot of dependency on receiving $139M payment that was withheld, I'd very likely feel a great "burden" pretty quickly. And if the exclusivity part of the engagement had my hands somewhat tied that there appeared to be no better options than killing my company, I'd consider that pretty "oppressive" too.
That's not necessarily painting Apple as the villain here; I also suspect that this is a GT biting-off-more-than-they-could-chew scenario. But I don't automatically assume that all of the blame must be on the one party not named Apple. Instead, I suspect the cause if we ever get the facts will be different than an evil CEO conspiring to bilk Apple out of a few hundred million dollars so he could bankrupt his company, kill his reputation and income and remaining stock share value and ride off into the sunset with the tin parachute of a $160K stock sale in September.
No no... I'm not propagating the evil CEO story... I'm not taking sides either, yet... Well atleast not until more of this comes forth...
Currently I feel GT was over confident and thought the exclusivity was a boon as they were gonna nail that bastard... But, their product didn't materialise or wasn't upto standards and **** hit the ceiling...
I think we'll see a lot more over the next week...
I totally agree. You didn't hear them complaining when Apple loaned them money to get their sapphire glass facilities running.
Thats because Apple's products are extremely sellable, anyone involved in part of their manufacturing or R&D process supply chain will simply whore themselves to Apple to get their contract, its a quick cash cow which is why Apple has their pick of suppliers who will readily give favourable terms to get that Apple cash. Just because it has not worked out for GTAT doesn't mean others are getting screwed either.
Along with getting juicy, the lawyers are licking their collective chops thinking about "Pay Day."
"Film at 11"
Lawyers see apple and want to make some cash. This is why you don't source anything from america, worst place to manufacturer anything unless you outright own the company. This is going to be a huge set back for American manufacturing as people will take note of it!
Oh well, it's such a shame this went south and i'm beyond confused how it didn't go right. if GT had perfected sapphire glass for phones and that was indeed why apple were investing to do phones with why didn't it happen. I assume GT over promised on something and apple had no agreement to actually buy. Personally see GT have no real case against apple, not in a real court of law.
Also $65,000 dollars sounds low to keep on specialists! I'm guessing bean counters are looking to run things by numbers and not what is best for the company. Long term if they pursue apple it will also put the nail in the coffin for GT advanced too as no future investors are going to want to invest as apple did to get sued.
Maybe they have entered bankruptcy as a way of taking apples investment and using it as a get out funds that lets them walk away from contracts as well, it seems a bit dodgy to me. I'm not sure where all that apple cash went and how GT have managed to avoid paying it back, or whether they already have. I thought the deal was they were given equipment that apple own, does that mean they don't need to give it back?
Really? GT knew exactly what they were getting into when they signed the contract with Apple. It wasn't like Apple said, "Just sign. It'll be easy, we'll give you the details later." Nobody forced them into this. Apple owned the land the plant sits on. They loaned the money to GT to build their plant. It just looks like GT got way in over their heads, needed a way out with as little damage as possible and this was their way out. Mind you the damage was significant in stock value, but they won't have to deal with the original agreement.
GT now wants to sell their equipment from the plant and get back to simply manufacturing the machines that make sapphire.
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Nothing as Apple can easily source sapphire elsewhere. Remember GT is/was simply one of many manufacturers of sapphire as this type of glass has been around for years on regular watches. However that said, maybe the reason why GT couldn't follow through with their end of the deal was because Apple may have set a higher standard for the sapphires they were looking for i.e. higher than the industry standard. Who knows.
Don't blame them. If you don't feel comfortable doing something, no amount of money makes it worthwhile to get stressed over. There's more to life than supplying unnecessary luxury goods to pampered consumers.
Life is too short and precious to be distracted and motivated by earthly wealth.
Life is too short and precious to be distracted and motivated by earthly wealth.
They are winding down operations, so it's actually the exact opposite of what you just said.
It may be hard being right, but being completely wrong seems to go down really easy.
I realize what the document says, and I realize they are winding down operations. Isn't there an ability to think abstractly here? They are OBVIOUSLY winding down operations for the sake of negotiations. Um, the title even implies that so you don't have to think abstractly. Who cares that on 10/11/14 they are winding down operations. On 12/11/14 you do realize something completely different could happen.
In other words, what's happening NOW could be different THEN. Is this making sense to you or to you think life is a cycle of unchange? The winding down of operations is a ploy. It's meaningless. It's a means to an end. It's a tactic.
Gosh, I hope you understand what I'm saying now, I really did say it in many different ways. Try not to take things so literally.