Tim Cook blasts the New York Times' report on Apple's Chinese iPad factories

Calls the suggestion that his company doesn't care about the health and safety of workers in the supply chain he built "patently false and offensive"

Cook

Here's one thing that's changed since Steve Jobs died.

When Tim Cook, Apple's (AAPL) new CEO, thinks his company has been wronged by the media, he doesn't shrink from hitting back -- swiftly and in a way that he knows will quickly become public.

This report that got Cook's goat -- the second in a New York Times series about working conditions in the Chinese factories that build nearly all of Apple's products -- was particularly painful, we imagine, on several levels:

• As Apple's long-time chief operating officer, he personally assembled the supply chain that the paper examined
• Apple is hardly the only U.S. electronics company that exploits an Asian labor force willing to work harder, for longer hours, in more onerous conditions and for considerably less pay than Americans. But as every business editor knows, Apple the one that draws the most readers.
• Apple, it can be argued, has done more than any of its competitors to monitor and improve the working conditions the Times' reporters zeroed in on
• Two of the harshest quotes in their piece came from current or former Apple employees

That last item may have stung the most. And you can almost hear the fury in Cook's message to his staff. It begins:

"As a company and as individuals, we are defined by our values. Unfortunately some people are questioning Apple's values today, and I'd like to address this with you directly. We care about every worker in our worldwide supply chain. Any accident is deeply troubling, and any issue with working conditions is cause for concern. Any suggestion that we don't care is patently false and offensive to us. As you know better than anyone, accusations like these are contrary to our values. It's not who we are."

The full text, first unearthed Thursday by 9to5Mac and confirmed by us as genuine, below the fold.

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Posted in: Apple, China, New York Times, Steve Jobs, supply chain, Tim Cook, Working conditions

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