Apple to build servers for data centers at suburban Phoenix plant
Jan 10, 2017, 10:14 AM | Updated: 1:18 pm
(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)
(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)
PHOENIX — Technology giant Apple will use its plant in suburban Phoenix to build servers for use in data centers, according to federal filings.
The Federal Register posted the filings Monday. The documents detail Apple’s plan to build most of its servers at its Mesa plant and then ship them to other data centers.
Under its old plan, the company would build and test servers on each site. The use of the Mesa plant to construct servers would consolidate those efforts.
The filings said Apple already has the “authority to produce certain components for consumer electronics” in the Mesa area, “the current request would add finished products and foreign status materials/components to the scope of authority.”
The filings also showed that Apple has asked the Foreign-Trade Zones Board to exempt it from customs duty payments on the finished servers. Such exemptions are given to create jobs in the United States that may otherwise be sent overseas to save on costs.
If the plan does indeed come to fruition, it would surely help the United States’ economy and excite President-elect Donald Trump, who has recently threatened to impose heavy taxes on domestic companies who move overseas but still sell their products to Americans.
Apple announced the Mesa plant in 2013. The plant was rumored to be be intended to build new iPods and iPhones, but it was later learned that it was creating specialized glass for those products.
However, it was then converted to a massive data center that serves as a hub for Apple’s cloud operations.
