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The Wall Street Journal today released a profile of Apple’s Vice President of Procurement, Tony Blevins, which provides an insight into Apple’s corporate culture and Blevins’ work for the company.
As Vice President of Procurement at Apple, Blevins’ job is to get suppliers to cut prices, and he appears to be temporarily stopping to do a cheap deal for Apple, which earned him the nickname “the Blevinator”.
For example, Blevins was the main driver that encouraged Apple suppliers to refuse Qualcomm to pay royalties in the ongoing dispute with the chipmaker. He negotiates with suppliers, enforces manufacturing details and manages semiconductor suppliers.
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His negotiating skills are so important to Apple that Cook hired him to manage negotiations for the Apple campus in the form of a spaceship. When he received quotes for the curved glass used for the structure, he invited glassmakers to Hong Kong, placed them in separate conference rooms, and went from room to room to get the lowest price. In the end, he saved Apple hundreds of millions of dollars.
Blevins has no hesitation in deleting suppliers. In one example, after STMicroelectronics refused to lower the price of gyroscope sensors in 2013, STM lost Apple’s business.
Blevins is also responsible for ensuring that suppliers comply with Apple’s nondisclosure agreements, which may result in fines. In 2017, Japan Display announced that it had received orders for liquid crystal displays, and the Wall Street Journal subsequently confirmed that Apple was one of the smartphone manufacturers that had expressed interest in LCDs, causing problems for Japan Display.
Mr. Blevins called a top manager of Japan Display and accused him of violating Apple’s non-disclosure agreement. “Are you stupid?” According to a person familiar with the request, Apple requested that Japan Display pay $ 5 million for violating the non-disclosure agreement. Japan Display did not pay, but promised to provide Apple with materials for the press conference prior to the events for Apple to review. A manager from Japan Display told the Wall Street Journal that Apple’s supplier agreements were “painful.”
When asked to comment, Blevins refrained from speaking to the Wall Street Journal and said, “I am a loyal employee.” The full profile of Blevins, which is much more detailed, can be found in the Wall Street Journal.
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