Watch How the iPad is Made Inside a Foxconn Factory

The Foxconn factories where Apple’s iPhone and iPad are made are notoriously secret, rarely letting reports venture into their depths. However, today, a new video was released giving the public a rare glimpse at how Foxconn makes the iPad.

Marketplace reporter Rob Schmitz posted the video of the process today and it offers a rare glimpse at the journey an iPad takes through the assembly lines inside Foxconn’s factories.

Schmitz is only the second report ever allowed into a Foxconn factory.

The first part of the day at the factory consists of supervisors giving Foxconn employees their daily assignments. The workers switch positions on the assembly line every couple of the days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5cL60TYY8oQ

Foxconn’s process of building the iPad gets accomplished using both by hand and through the help of machines.

The first leg of the iPad’s journey starts on a floor where the device’s motherboard is put together. Worker and machine work together during this process. The iPad then moves down the line and components are added one by one with some steps taking just seconds to be finished.

For instance, the video shows the battery being pressed into the iPad, a process that takes a matter of seconds.

Workers then install the LED touchscreen and then the device is placed inside a machine that tests its gyroscope which is a feature used when playing games. The screen then gets tested to make sure it’s functional and the iPad is then placed in a box, ready to be shipped off around the globe.

While Schmitz shows us a look at the process of building the iPad, he also touches on the workers involved.

A large majority of the workers inside of these factories are migrant workers who have traveled from across China to work for Foxconn, to send back their wages to help their families.

Wages start at just $14 a day and double in a couple of years.

Read: Apple and Foxconn Will Work To Improve Pay and Working Conditions.

However, the low pay and the tedium of the job  doesn’t deter hundreds of workers showing up on a daily basis looking for work. In fact, the conditions and pay at Foxconn are supposedly better than most factories in China.

Schmitz is the reporter that blew the whistle on Mike Daisey who has been accused of partially fabricating his reports on the conditions at Foxconn’s factories.