Katie Marsal
Taiwanese tech industry publication DigiTimes reported on Tuesday that metal chassis supply "continues to suffer from shortage." The reason: Apple is buying most of the supply available for its unibody MacBook lineup, including the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air.
The two largest metal chassis manufacturers, Catcher Technology and Foxconn, have reportedly been "aggressively establishing new CNC machines." But they are said to be unlikely to full demand until the end of 2012.
Tuesday's report said that PC makers have begun building "ultra-like" notebooks, rather than laptops that meet Intel's "Ultrabook" specification, as Ultrabooks have suffered from "weak sales." The switch to "ultra-like" notebooks has caused shortages of slim panels, in addition to metal chassis.
While traditional display panels are about 5.2 to 5.5 millimeters thick, slim panels measure about 3.6 millimeters, slightly thicker than the panels measuring 2.85 to 3 millimeters found in Ultrabooks.
This week's report isn't the first time sources in the Far East supply chain have indicated that Apple has a firm grasp on metal notebook chassis supply. One report from last August claimed that companies were forced to seek alternatives because Apple controlled most of the "significantly limited" capacity of magnesium-aluminum chassis.
Apple's entire notebook line features a unibody aluminum design, and the full product lineup was given a refresh earlier this month to Intel's latest-generation Ivy Bridge processors. The flagship notebook in Apple's lineup is its new next-generation MacBook Pro which is 0.71 inches thick and features a 15-inch high-resolution Retina display.
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77 Comments
Insert Digitimes joke here.
Oh dear, so copying has its down side after all! Maybe the PC industry should design something unique to themselves and avoid this situation.
Gotta love horribly biased articles. Apple isn't locking anything up. When Apple persued Unibody 4 years ago they had to go out and buy "aircraft quality" prototyping CNC machines FOR their suppliers to operate. These are $250k a pop, and Apple is competing with prototype engineering firms al over the WORLD for these. Other companies were more than able to buy their own.. Of course Apple has new machines already PAID FOR 2-3 years out. Apple stuck its neck WAY out on these machines while everybody else was laughing at them. Even if the other manufacturers did have the machines right now, Apple still has a 4-year head start on making them profitable. Apple put a considerable amount of its own upfront money into Foxconn for these machines. They are not "market resources" they are APPLE'S resources they paid for FIRST. Apple isn't using unfair tactics... Other than planning 3 years ahead to buy stuff nobody thought of yet. They are THAT far ahead of everybody else!
[quote name="digitalclips" url="/t/150914/pc-makers-struggle-as-apple-locks-up-metal-chassis-supply#post_2134450"]Oh dear, so copying has its down side after all! Maybe the PC industry should design something unique to themselves and avoid this situation.[/quote] Remember when the unibody Macs first appeared and the naysayers said how it was so pointless?
Gotta love horribly biased articles.
Apple isn't locking anything up. When Apple persued Unibody 4 years ago they had to go out and buy "aircraft quality" prototyping CNC machines FOR their suppliers to operate. These are $250k a pop, and Apple is competing with prototype engineering firms al over the WORLD for these. Other companies were more than able to buy their own.. Of course Apple has new machines already PAID FOR 2-3 years out.
Apple stuck its neck WAY out on these machines while everybody else was laughing at them. Even if the other manufacturers did have the machines right now, Apple still has a 4-year head start on making them profitable. Apple put a considerable amount of its own upfront money into Foxconn for these machines. They are not "market resources" they are APPLE'S resources they paid for FIRST.
Apple isn't using unfair tactics... Other than planning 3 years ahead to buy stuff nobody thought of yet. They are THAT far ahead of everybody else!
4 years ago... heck it was longer than that (they were carving iPods out of Aluminum in what, 2006?.