Apple supplier Luxshare Precision tries to shake off contract manufacturer tag and become a solutions provider

Luxshare Precision Industry, a key Apple supplier, is repositioning itself as a solutions provider instead of a contract manufacturer for big brands, according to its chairwoman.

Wang Laichun, the 57-year-old low profile founder and chairwoman of Luxshare, said in an interview on the sidelines of China’s annual legislative gathering that the business of contract manufacturing – assembling products in accordance with customer requests – “does not have a soul”, indicating her desire to move away from low value-added processing.

Wang is a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, the country’s top political advisory body.

Wang, who has transformed her business from a humble cable connector into a key assembler of Apple products including AirPods, the iPhone and Vision Pro, was quoted by magazine China Entrepreneur as saying that Luxshare now wants to provide clients with solutions.

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“To me, contract manufacturing [is a practice that] has nothing to do with market analysis or technology build-up, and no way to solve client pain points, that’s contract manufacturing,” Wang said.

However, Wang has sought to shake off the “contract manufacturer” image before.

At the company’s annual stakeholder event held last May, the Chinese billionaire businesswoman told an audience that it was belittling to call her company an “original equipment manufacturer [OEM]”.

“We are a solutions provider,” Wang said at the time, adding that it would be difficult for a pure OEM firm to survive in today’s market, referring to the sophistication involved in making advanced consumer electronics.

Wang was among the first 150 employees hired by Foxconn Technology Group, the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer, at its inaugural factory in mainland China in southern Shenzhen in the 1980s.

Wang later transitioned from the assembly line to establishing her own business, which eventually emerged as a significant rival to her previous employer and a crucial component in Apple’s global supply chain.

Luxshare, a major supplier of Apple’s AirPods Pro earbuds, was tapped to make more iPhones in late 2022 after worker unrest at Foxconn’s Zhengzhou plant, the world’s largest iPhone factory, created shipment delays.

Shenzhen-based Luxshare was also one of the assemblers of Apple’s newly-released Vision Pro headset, according to a bill of materials analysis by local consultancy Wellsenn XR.

Last year Wang’s Luxshare made it for the first time to Fortune’s Global 500 ranking of companies with the biggest revenue, coming in at 479.

The company has been seeking to expand beyond consumer electronics into the telecoms and automobile sectors, Wang told a forum when attending a Shenzhen chamber of commerce event early last year.

Wang has lauded the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the traditional manufacturing industry and the productivity gains it can potentially bring.

“[We] must keep on with AI so as to level up productivity and to resolve many … technology challenges,” Wang was cited as saying in the China Entrepreneur report.