A Few Headlines Heading into the Holiday…

This morning’s news brought a couple of headlines that are relevant to the last post on The Changing Structure of Technology Companies. The first article is from the Nikkei Asia Review which states that “…Global consumer electronics makers HP, Dell, Microsoft and Amazon are all looking to shift substantial production capacity out of China, joining a growing exodus that threatens to undermine the country’s position as the world’s powerhouse for tech gadgets.”

That should not be a surprise if you have read my last post. This is transition is happening and investors and business leaders should not be surprised.  It is going to have a material affect on the financials of tech companies.  Interesting quote from the article “Total Chinese imports and exports in the electronics segment ballooned 136 times to $1.35 trillion in 2017 from just over $10 billion back in 1991, according to Chinese data provider QianZhan.” What is a trillion and change amongst friends?

From Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat,“The Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention argues that no two countries that are both part of the same global supply chain will ever fight a war as long as they are each part of that supply chain;” the connectedness and sense of place in single defining theory of conflict prevention.”

The article I was more interested to read was this one concerning a recent live fire test by the PLA Navy of anti-ship missiles. The article states “China asserts control more than 80 percent of the South China Sea, overlapping with the claims of Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.” I have been working on a short paper looking at naval lessons from the North Sea in the lead up to the First World War. With this news, there is no better time for me to finish that post before Sunday night.

As always, my thoughts on these matters might be completely wrong.