UnpluggedRob
New Member
They are actually in the same building
EG4 now made in USA? video link
- Thread starter sumpower
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ksmithaz1
Solar / EV Junkie
While a healthy dose of skepticism is warranted. . . This is actually a great start. Let's say the box contains 25 major independent components. Let's say TODAY all those components are only available from China, so you order them and assemble it here. As the components become available elsewhere, you get them from elsewhere, gradually reducing your dependency on Chinese components. I can assure you if it's assembled in China anything that CAN be sourced from a Chinese source WILL be sourced from a Chinese source.
If China doesn't play ball, even if you have to source components from India, Malaysia, Mexico, or Singapore, it's still a win, as this dilutes the costs of any tariff's associated with an individual component used in constructing the item. Over time, if the component can be made here without a ridiculous price discrepancy it will. There is no good reason a large number of these components could not be made here if the pricing is competitive and fair.
If China doesn't play ball, even if you have to source components from India, Malaysia, Mexico, or Singapore, it's still a win, as this dilutes the costs of any tariff's associated with an individual component used in constructing the item. Over time, if the component can be made here without a ridiculous price discrepancy it will. There is no good reason a large number of these components could not be made here if the pricing is competitive and fair.
Adam De Lay
Solar Wizard
Sounds like Q3/4 they'll have some batteries using LG cells from MI.
ksmithaz1
Solar / EV Junkie
I'm sure that is what is currently going on. The question is where did the heatsinks, and relays, and circuit boards come from? You have to start at the assembly, pointless to build the relays here then ship them to china for assembly. The next steps are to build the wiring harnesses, and then find a US manufacturer that can build the relays, the wire for the harnesses, ...
It's a momentum change, as in the past we saw the opposite occurring, as components were gradually and increasingly outsourced overseas, until the assembly cost was reduced dramatically by sending it to where the components were originating. The bulkier an item is the more sense it makes to assemble it closer to it's market, to reduce overall logistics costs. Smaller simpler items were the first to leave the US escalating to finished products that are small and relatively inexpensive to transport on a shipping container. This really isn't that complicated.
timselectric
If I can do it, you can do it.
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- Feb 5, 2022
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The same place that they always have.
Luxpower
BarracudaBob
Harvesting free photons from clean fusion
I thought he said from Michigan but I may have got it confused with a couple other stories I heard.
It will take many years to change where electronic parts are sourced. It takes that long to build the infrastructure to make these parts.
With the current instability of USA policies, nobody is planning to build plants here that would make those parts in the first place.
The rest of the world will buy them cheaply from foreign sources even if we do make them here. That will make all USA manufacturers start at a disadvantage and reduce the volume a USA plant can have, further making it more expensive due to loss of scale.
We live in a world where 75% of the global GDP is outside the USA. That 75% of economic activity will drive products to be made in the cheapest place possible. The USA can't change that no matter what we do, and that will make everybody outside the USA far more competitive than we can be.
If we force our goods to come only from the USA, we will pay a huge amount more for them, which is the same as making our money worth a lot less. Our standard of living will go down.
If EG4 builds their boxes in the USA, the VAST majority of the parts will still come from China with some coming from other Asian sources. Almost none of the electronic parts will be produced in the USA. That is just the way it is in electronics manufacturing. It is a delusional dream to expect otherwise.
Mike C.
UnpluggedRob
New Member
I met Troy, the president of EG4, when their facility first opened and got a chance to tour the place. He mentioned their plan is to source as much as they can from within the U.S., and for anything they can’t, the plan is to eventually start manufacturing those parts themselves, one piece at a time. I’m not sure how realistic that is, but that’s what they told me.
ksmithaz1
Solar / EV Junkie
Well Eeyore,
We make plenty of electronic parts here in the US, just not at scale, which makes them fairly expensive. There are a couple of FAB's here in Phoenix that make short runs of obsolete IC's, and the tooling is not bleeding edge. They move around, re-tool constantly. I really don't understand why nobody thinks we can make stuff here in the US competitively. I call BS! Further, while it does take years to build a fab to make cutting edge IC's like modern AMD or INTEL CPU's the same is not true for the majority of the components inside of an inverter which do not require state of the art FAB's and 4nm dies. An effing relay is some metal, and wire with a plastic case. It does not cost billions of dollars and take 5 years to tool up to make relays at scale for a competitive price. It does not cost billions and take years to build a factory that can fold up sheet metal into boxes. If you can get that folded box from another country at 25% of the cost to make it here, then someone is seriously cheating somewhere, because the bulk of the cost is NOT the labor.
I can assure you this. If you start from a defeatest point of view, you will create a self-fufilling prophesy. If you never try, I can assure you you won't, and there is no reason we cannot be competitive on many of the items in the EG4 inverters. Much of the stuff produced in China spews out of relatively small factories, many of which are built and re-tooled in a relatively short time. If we kept a small across the board tariff in place, like 15% then as an American company you would get a small 15% advantage, thus if you could get real cost within say 5% of a foreign competitor, not only would you have the US market, but you would pick up overflow in the global market. Further, if you produce a more reliable product or have a more reliable supply chain, you can easily dig further into the global market.
Quit telling me what we can't do, and start talking about what we can do. It's ignorant to think we don't have the skills and prowess in the United States to compete in a large part of these markets, if the playing field was a bit more level. Quit coming up with reaasons we can't and start coming up with ideas so we can.
Cryin out loud.
ksmithaz1
Solar / EV Junkie
“I never get my hopes up, so I never get let down.” -Eeyore
We can continue to lead the world in innovation and development if US companies can deploy leading edge competitive products using foreign low cost manufacturing.
We have now turned off that resource to a large degree.
Americans slaving away for a low wage in factories making cell phones is not progress. That is what you are asking for, although I am sure you don't realize it yet.
Being inventors, developers, creators, that is where we should aim. If those people can't get their products made so they get a large market share, those jobs go away.
Mike C.
HighDesertDrifter
Teaching is a rare skill, Thanks to those who do!
I don't believe it's lack of skills holding us back, but immense greed for profits.
Number one rule of business is to never run out of money.
Considering how fast our money supply is expanding, companies are incentivized to use cheap debt from the government to stay alive. This is where we apply the term, zombie company. They do not rely on creating competitive products or services, but aim to exploit sources of cheap capital, such as newly printed money. This is only available to large companies. Look up the cantillon effect.
Considering how fast our money supply is expanding, companies are incentivized to use cheap debt from the government to stay alive. This is where we apply the term, zombie company. They do not rely on creating competitive products or services, but aim to exploit sources of cheap capital, such as newly printed money. This is only available to large companies. Look up the cantillon effect.
And not entirely sure about that sentiment considering the volume of engineer graduates overseas right now.
Once eg4 is manufacturing board components here in America and processing the raw materials, I'll call them "made in USA".
We've been trying to catch up in terms of raw material processing for the last five years and we are failing miserably as a country. We do not have the tech or the engineers able to pull this off. Or else these companies would have profited from this and propelled America forward. Maybe it's our high corporate tax? Makes every Chinese company a mail forwarding, overnight business. We need to drop the taxes so we are competitive globally for manufacturing.
We've been trying to catch up in terms of raw material processing for the last five years and we are failing miserably as a country. We do not have the tech or the engineers able to pull this off. Or else these companies would have profited from this and propelled America forward. Maybe it's our high corporate tax? Makes every Chinese company a mail forwarding, overnight business. We need to drop the taxes so we are competitive globally for manufacturing.
If it was advantageous for Chinese companies to establish corporations here they would.
I think it's best to not listen to what people say and look at their actions instead. There's a reason why manufacturing and processing is not increasing here in America.
I think it's best to not listen to what people say and look at their actions instead. There's a reason why manufacturing and processing is not increasing here in America.
If the raw materials and board components are not manufactured in America, I'm going to say that the products are assembled in America in my videos. I am going to stop saying "made in USA" because these things are not.
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That aligns with the FTC guidance:
Complying with the Made in USA Standard
Do you promote your products as “Made in the USA”? Under the law, some products must disclose U.S. content. For others, manufacturers and marketers who choose to make claims about the amount of U.S. content need to know about the FTC’s Made in USA Labeling Rule and Enforcement Policy Statement...
If EG4 imports PCBAs and then screws them into a cabinet, that doesn't meet the definition of "assembled in the USA". The FTC calls that a "screwdriver" operation.
If EG4 imports the basic electronic parts and has the PCBAs made here in the USA, and then assembles that into a cabinet, then that should meet the definition of "assembled in the USA". It still isn't "made in the USA" due to the essentially all the electrical components being of foreign origin.
Hardly anything electronic is "made in the USA" using the FTC guidance.
Note that "country of origin" (COO) is entirely a different standard used by the CBP. That standard is the country where the last "significant transformation" took place. If EG4 imports PCBAs and then screws them into a cabinet, then the COO is the USA as far as tariffs are concerned, but that doesn't make it "assembled in the USA".
There is a lot of misuse of these terms out there.
Mike C.
HighDesertDrifter
Teaching is a rare skill, Thanks to those who do!
I was just thinking on this earlier. I too have been a business owner, and indeed without "profits" we would not be able to continue.
If you pay close attention here, it was "greed" for "immense" profits. It wasn't having a biz without any profits, as that would then become a government...
Requiring taxation.Back in the day we were very satisfied to make enough profit to maintain equipment, make payroll and have a trip to the coast every year or two fishing for vacation. That seemed to require a modest profit to continue in such a manner.
Then came the days of "EXTREMES" extreme sports, extreme social non norms, extreme interference of govt in everyone's life and biz, and right along with it came what I would call "extreme profits."
Now when you sit around and listen to people boast about who has the most toys and who flies to Maui more frequently at a neighborhood BBQ, you just ain't with it if your not living the iconoclastic lifestyle so many have come to expect as normal and deserved. In these peoples mind, your business just isn't very profitable.
You can keep all that and those who do, as for me, KISS...
This is certain, uncertain riches are deceitful and one day will vanish like the smoke from a chimney as it wafts away in a strong norther.
Profits are not evil, money is not evil, GREED for more and more is evil. They asked the richest guy on earth, "My god man, when will you ever have enough?" He thought for a moment prudently and replied, "Just a little more, a little more!"
I personally could never get a good nights sleep if I bought widgets for $1 and sold them to those who didn't know how to make one or where to acquire one as I had for $25. Nowadays, that's just DOPE...
hmmm?
HighDesertDrifter
Teaching is a rare skill, Thanks to those who do!
HMMM, you make a good point, no good paying jobs for them here from the iconoclastic elite class? If people can't plainly see all the money is being hoovered up by the few, then to keep profits high & stocks up, they keep you in debt and your pay low, hmmmm?
Land of the slave
Home of the afraid
I assume "processing the raw materials" includes "buying things from US-owned companies which process the raw materials in the US"?
Since Aug 2021 the FTC has had a "Made in USA Labeling Rule", which seems pretty stiff. (Enforced with substantial fines, and expect the current administration to actually enforce it.)
From https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/complying-made-usa-standard:
Most of those last five years have been under the Biden administration. Trump has several bees in his bonnet about fixing the tax system, and that's being pushed through congress right now, as the "One Big Beautiful Bill". (Wasn't that what they used to call an "Omnibus Bill"?) Though you mostly hear about the big turnarounds in favor individual contributor white and blue collar and service-level taxpayers, count on there being stuff in there to promote domestic manufacturing.
He also apparently considers renewables (especially solar) to be something that needs to be domestically manufactured - though neither government subsidized and mandated nor government red tape impeded. (As with IC vs EV vehicles, he isn't wedded to fuel vs. renewable, but thinks the customers should make their own choices without the government herding them one way or another.) Look for benign encouragement and roadblock-clearing for solar equipment companies starting up or converting to US manufacture, and don't hold your breath waiting for the import barriers to come completely down. (But I do expect them to drop from "disconnect from China" levels if/when China accepts the face-hit enough to start back-room negotiations with the US on more "fair to both sides" tariff/import regulation changes, rather than shooting their other foot off fighting. That might be pretty soon, but that ball is on China's side of the court right now.)
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HighDesertDrifter
Teaching is a rare skill, Thanks to those who do!
In the end there can only be one, it's futile to resist you will be assimilated. (They wish you to believe)
No matter which side appears to be in charge.
One will be by the death of a thousand cuts
The other at "Warp speed."
hey, but I never finished Highschool, what could I possibly know?
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