IHS

A product teardown of both the new 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus devices last week confirmed earlier reports that Apple is indeed opting for TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company) to produce the 20nm, second generation 64-bit A8 chip that drives the new iPhones. Research firm IHS, however, has shared a teardown analysis report with Re/code that claims Samsung is still responsible for a fraction of Apple’s A8 chips produced.

Rassweiler said the processor he saw during the teardown was manufactured by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the massive chip-factory-for-hire based in Taipei. […] Rassweiler says TSMC is manufacturing about 60 percent of the chips for Apple, while Samsung is still turning about about 40 percent.

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As always, the guys over at IHS iSuppli have just published analysis of their iPhone 4S teardown showing a BOM of $188 for the 16GB and in the process revealing some previously undisclosed suppliers.

The $188 BOM is of course for the entry-level 16GB model, which would also inflate to $196 if factoring in an $8 manufacturing cost. BOM for the 32GB model comes in at $207 (again, before manufacturing), and $245 for the 64GB variant.

The report describes the 4S’s insides as including a “wealth of innovation”, in contrast to the device’s feature set which was received as an incremental upgrade by most. Among the suprises revealed during the teardown– NAND flash memory supplied by Hynix Semiconductor (a first for iPhone) and a “unique custom” wireless module from Avago Technologies Ltd.  The device torn down by iSuppli carried the same sony Sensor as the device X-Rayed by Chipworks but they postulate that Omnivision may also provide an 8-megapixel sensor as well for some of the devices.

Senior director of teardown services for IHS, Andrew Rassweiler, explains:
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In a note last night, Wayne Lam of IHS-iSuppli made the case against Apple going with 1st generation LTE chips in its next iPhone.

“It remains to be seen whether the next Apple iPhone set for introduction in September will support 4G LTE,” said Wayne Lam, senior analyst for IHS. “However, if it does, two things are clear. First, the iPhone’s minuscule printed circuit board (PCB) will have to grow in size in order to support the first-generation LTE baseband processor as well as all the supporting chipset. Second, the next iPhone’s BOM value certainly will increase substantially compared to the iPhone 4 if LTE is implemented in the same manner as in the HTC Thunderbolt.”

I think Apple is more concerned with the extra space and battery life the new chips would consume much more than the extra cost of the components.“The first generation of LTE chipsets forced a lot of design compromises with the handset, and some of those we are just not willing to make,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple chief financial officer, speaking at the company’s April 2011 earnings call.

The next round of chips which would allow Apple to put LTE in a similarly sized package won’t hit the streets until the first half of 2012.

I don’t see an iPhone as big at the Thundebolt or Charge, ever. 
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Besides the extremely unfortunate loss of life, Bloomberg posts a dire scenario on iPad production laid out by IHS iSuppli this evening:

The drop in manufacturing will depend on how long the plant is closed following a May 20 explosion that killed three people and injured at least 15, according to ISuppli. The total could be even greater if the suspension of operations at the facility lasts longer than a month, the firm said.

Another Foxconn factory in Shenzhen that produces iPads may not be able to make up for the lost output, ISuppli said. The manufacturing breakdown may lead Apple to miss ISuppli’s forecast of 7.4 million iPad 2 shipments in the quarter ending in June, the El Segundo, California-based research firm said.

Not all analysts are as down with Apple Bull Shaw Wu saying there may not be cause to worry.  He said in a report today that the concerns are “overdone” and that production at other facilities is being ramped up to make up for the shortfalls. He expects Apple to sell 6.8 million iPads in the June quarter.

Related articles

• Foxconn closes all of its electronic parts polishing workshops for 2 days (9to5mac.com)
• The Foxconn explosion might affect up to one third of total iPad 2 output (9to5mac.com)
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