Status: 10/13/2021 9:19 a.m.
For a long time, the Apple company seemed immune to the chip crisis. But now the delivery bottlenecks hit him too. Because of a lack of chips, Apple cannot produce millions of iPhones.
Customers may have to wait longer for their new iPhone: Due to the global shortage of chips, Apple is likely to be able to deliver significantly fewer smartphones in the current quarter. It can be assumed that the Californian company will have to correct its annual production target for the new iPhone by ten million downwards, reported the Bloomberg news agency, citing insiders.
Originally 90 million pieces of the iPhone13 should be manufactured in the Christmas quarter. According to Bloomberg, Apple has told its manufacturers that this amount will be lower. The reason the company from San Cupertino cites problems of the suppliers Broadcom and Texas Instruments in delivering chips. Apple is getting a chip from Texas Instruments, among others, that controls the display power supply for the new iPhone.
There has not yet been an official confirmation. Neither Apple, Broadcom, or Texas Instruments wanted to comment on Bloomberg’s report.
Still the flagship of the group
Apple presented the new iPhone 13 in mid-September. It has better cameras and displays. The smartphone is also powered by a new chip developed in-house. Apple speaks of the most powerful processor system in a smartphone.
The iPhone is still by far the most important product of the group. In the second quarter, the smartphone business accounted for nearly half of Apple’s total revenue. Sales of the iPhones rose by almost 50 percent.
With 49.3 million devices and a market share of 15 percent, Apple is number three in the global smartphone business. That comes from the statistics of the market researcher Gartner. The Chinese Xiaomi group recently overtook the US group and has a market share of 15.5 percent. Number one is Samsung with a market share of 17.6 percent.
Numbers come in two weeks
Apple will announce on October 28th how much the chip shortage has slowed sales of the iPhone in the past third quarter. Then the group publishes its figures.
The Bloomberg report on the upcoming lowering of the production target for the new iPhone depressed Apple shares after hours. They fell by around one percent.