Mike Wuerthele
The latest supply chain reports out of China are refuting previous observations that the "iPhone 8" would be delayed, and are claiming that manufacturers of previous low-yield products have resolved production problems.
According to a report early Monday from the Economic Daily News, laminate motherboard suppliers Zhen Ding, and Kinsus Interconnect have worked out difficulties, and are ready to ramp up iPhone parts in June. Long-time Apple supplier TSMC is ready to go with the "A11" chip, also according to the report, and will also start producing in mass quantities on June 10, with volume quantities arriving at Foxconn in the second half of July.
At the same time, the report alleges that iPhone assemblers Foxconn Electronics, Wistron and Pegatron have started the hiring surge process, and required training, to have an adequate work force on hand.
Multiple venues declared in April that the "iPhone 8" would ship significantly later than "normal" iPhone timetables. While the reports stated that the phone would launch alongside the "iPhone 7s" family in Apple's regular September event, the April accounts noted that it may not ship until significantly later.
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo cautioned investors that Apple's anticipated flagship "iPhone 8" could be in extremely limited supply in 2017, thanks to the expected adoption of a number of new technologies. As a result, customers could wait, or shift interest to the "iPhone 7s" family of phones which are expected to be released at the same time, potentially capping iPhone shipments in the holiday quarter.
The "iPhone 8" is predicted to sport an edge-to-edge OLED panel with a 5.1-inch user space — the rest dedicated to virtual buttons. Slimming or removing the bezels would allow Apple to cram a larger battery into a form factor similar in size to the 4.7-inch iPhone 7. Also expected is a new 3D facial scanner .
With a complete redesign said to be forthcoming in the device implementing a curved glass back with wireless charging, some reports have pegged the starting price of the "iPhone 8" at more than $1,000.
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Wesley Hilliard
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27 Comments
Which report to believe? The positive one that says production problems are solved? Or the negative one that says production will be seriously delayed? Decisions, decisions. Since this is an Apple blog site I guess I’ll go with the negative one. Yep, there’s no way the iPhone 8 will launch in 2017 because Apple is incompetent... and doomed.
Every rumor/news site makes themselves sound like an idiot when they say "iPhone 8". There was a 3G/3GS, 4/4S, 5/5S, 6/6S,7 and the next phone will be the 7S. Saying "iPhone 8 coming this year" or even iPhone X as the tenth iPhone (the iPhone 7 was the 10th iPhone if you don't count the iPhone 5c) as being special...you're not doing your job as journalists/bloggers and you're simply creating confusion for consumers who don't know better by creating false and heightened expectations for "clicks"
its not in Apples culture to celebrate anniversaries by withholding technology for those releases. The 40th anniversary of Mac was last year and Apple celebrated by releasing a video titled "40 years of Mac in 40 seconds" that's it...no special 40th anniversary Mac or special color option. It's not in their culture to focus on where they've been.
It makes no sense for them to release a substantially improved phone in the S cycle which would annoy every consumer who purchased an iPhone 7 UNTIL the world is more used to purchasing a new phone when they want and not on the 2 year cycle tha current installment billing plans still encourage. This will happen eventually in the USA but not for a few more years
As usual.
Of course a company that supplies parts for Apple is going to say were going to deliver. Why would they say anything else? We'll see when the time comes if they can deliver or not. Until then...well its just all speculation.