The highly anticipated iPhone Ultra appears to be back on track for a September launch. Sources in Apple’s supply chain indicate that the company’s first foldable phone will enter mass production next month, despite concerns surrounding the performance of the device’s hinge in durability tests.
The Elec this week reports that Apple has finalized the Ultra’s key specifications, including its display, case, and mechanical components, and that the device has entered the preparation phase for mass production. Citing interviews with supply-chain officials in Korea and Taiwan, the site says mass production is likely to begin in late July, with Foxconn handling the initial batch, and that a September unveiling is “expected to proceed without major issues.”
There may not be major issues, but the project has not been without its fair share of minor ones. For the past couple of months, pundits have blown hot and cold between predicting delays and insisting it’s on track.
Trial production has been underway since April, and the results of this phase are crucial for the timing of later stages of production. The Elec’s sources are cautiously optimistic, but they do note that the iPhone Ultra’s hinge has caused some worries. It cites one Taiwanese source as saying that “slight noise occurred in the hinges after durability tests involving millions of cycles” and that “in some assembly processes, tolerances were larger than expected, resulting in a slightly higher defect rate.”
As with all foldables, the success or failure of the iPhone Ultra depends to a large extent on the performance of its hinge. Apple’s customers will be asked to pay roughly twice as much for the Ultra as for a top-end non-folding iPhone, while accepting an additional point of mechanical failure. Apple thought it had solved that part of the equation, having bought worldwide exclusive rights to a zirconium-based alloy in 2010, but it will only take a few hinge failures in the wild to spark another Bendgate-level controversy.
Speaking about the hinge concerns, the Taiwanese official insisted that “most of these issues have now been resolved.” This is Apple’s biggest product launch of the year, and the company will hope it can do rather better than that.
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