iPhone 6 Plus

While the relatively modest iPad updates might have led to a flurry of ‘Apple is doomed’ reports from analysts, an early roundup by Fortune suggests that the consensus view so far remains positive. Most are rating it a buy or overweight – meaning they expect it to outperform typical stocks – with the majority setting a target price in the $112-120 range …

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The iPhone 6/Plus finally went on sale in China this morning after regulatory delays, in contrast to last year’s launch of the iPhone 5s and 5c in China on the same day as the US … 
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Apple’s bankrupt former sapphire supplier is seeking to shut down its Mesa, Arizona plant and has informed 727 employees that they will be laid off between today and December 15th, according to AZ Central. The breakdown of the jobs being cut includes:

…524 production workers, 108 technical positions, 70 management jobs and 25 administrative jobs, according to the notice signed by Linda Luman, vice president of human resources for GT.

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Update: Visit Apple.com/ApplePay for the latest information on where to use Apple Pay in stores, and featured Apple Pay apps for iPhone and iPad here.

With Apple Pay launching on Monday with iOS 8.1 for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus users, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared an update at today’s special event with additional retailers and iOS apps that will accept Apple Pay at launch or have committed to accept Apple Pay in the future. According to Apple’s microsite for Apple Pay, the company has added 16 additional retailers and venues with plans to accept Apple Pay at launch or in the future. In addition to those retailers and venues, Apple has added 12 additional apps that plan to accept Apple Pay starting on Monday or sometime after the launch date.
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An internal memo sent to Panera Bread employees and acquired by 9to5Mac has revealed that Apple will launch its mobile payment platform on Monday, October 20th. Panera Bread was listed as one of the initial launch partners for Apple Pay during its introduction last month.

An online training course for employees has been published that includes instructions for the VeriFone readers, including the Apple Pay functions. Stores that don’t have the appropriate hardware to support the technology will receive further information on the 20th about how the company plans to handle payments those locations.
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Morgan Stanley’s Katy Huberty has added AAPL to its Best Ideas list of investments, saying that increased margins from iPhone 6 sales see the stock “set for significant upside.”

While Credit Suisse had earlier suggested that margins on the iPhone 6 would be lower than that of the iPhone 5s and 5c, Huberty says that numerous sources are suggesting that more people this time are opting for the middle storage tier, thus pushing up both average selling price and margins … 
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Not much is known about Apple’s deals with its suppliers, but court filings by former sapphire supplier GT Advanced reveal that the contract included a $50M penalty for any leak of Apple product information, reports the Financial Times.

While the amount of the penalty clause may vary according to the size of the supplier, it seems likely that a substantial leak penalty is a standard condition of supplying product components to Apple – though the number of leaks over the iPhone 6 suggests that such penalties offer limited protection.

Contracts between Apple and its suppliers will undoubtedly be subject to strict non-disclosure agreements, but lawyers for GT Advanced are asking the court to allow details to be made public … 
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Apple has announced that it will be rolling out the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus to an additional 36 countries this month, bringing the total number of markets to 69. The latest rollout will begin with India and Monaco alongside China on Friday.

Apple today announced that iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the biggest advancements in iPhone history, will arrive in 36 additional countries and territories across Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and Africa by the end of October. iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will be available in a total of 69 countries and territories by the end of the month and are on track to be available in more than 115 countries by the end of the year, making this the fastest iPhone rollout ever … 

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Ahead of next Thursday’s Apple event, new images purportedly showing parts for the new, full-sized iPad have emerged. Photos re-published by blog apple.club.tw show a full logic board for the new iPad Air as well as parts for the new Home button, glass screen cover, and audio control components. At first glance, the new iPad Air logic board does not reveal too much new, but adjusting the colors of the image shows a fairly unexpected addition: an A8X system-on-a-chip:

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Sprint prepaid subsidiary Boost Mobile announced today that it will begin carrying the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus for customers starting next Friday on October 17th. As it has done in the past with the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c, Boost Mobile will carry the new iPhone models for $100 off the usual retail price of each device. Below is Boost Mobile’s full pricing lineup for each storage capacity of both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus:
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The Wall Street Journal has published new information about the breakdown of a deal between Apple and GT Advanced Technologies Inc. that led the latter to file for bankruptcy earlier this week. As was previously noted, Apple withheld a $139 million payment from the sapphire supplier, though the exact reasoning was unclear.

In a research note released yesterday, KGI confirmed that GTAT was Apple’s first choice for these displays because the company had created a process that provided superior drop test results. Now the Journal reports that the payment was withheld after GT Advanced failed to meet Apple’s requirements for the iPhone 6 display.

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Apple’s sapphire processing plant in Mesa, AZ

The Wall Street Journal has cast some more light on recent reports that Apple’s sapphire supplier had declared bankruptcy earlier this week. According to the Journal’s report, Apple withheld a payment of $139 million from GT Advanced, though currently there’s no indication of why this decision was made.

In another interesting revelation, the Journal also discovered that the CEO of GT Advanced, Thomas Gutierrez, unloaded all of his stock in the company in a sale just one day before the iPhone 6 was unveiled. The device was widely expected to use sapphire supplied by GT for its displays. GT Advanced had enjoyed a rising stock price that had nearly doubled since initial rumors of a collaboration on the iPhone 6 started swirling.

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Ray Ozzie, who used to be Microsoft’s Chief Technical Officer and Chief Software Architect, has come out with a new app for the iPhone. In an extensive profile, Steven Levy explains the premise behind the app, dubbed Talko. You can read the full overview on Medium. The app has been in development for more than two years.

A new take on phone calls, the app shows if your recipient is currently walking or driving — giving a hint at attentiveness of the speaker before the conversation even begins. It’s a nice use of the Apple M7 and M8 coprocessors. Any voice communication is archived into the growing thread … to organize a conversation like any other modern chat app really. Talko seems best as an app for modern meetings, like a conference call replacement, although Ozzie insists it can be used beyond business.

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Following some statistical analysis from yesterday that indicated the iPhone 6 usage ratio was beginning to favor iPhone 6 Plus, Digitimes now reports that Apple is following through on market shifts with production schedule adjustments.

Digitimes says that with iPhone 6 Plus exceeding expectations, Apple has asked the supply chain to move some production away from its 4.7 inch phone. This will mean that shipments for iPhone 6 will fall by 3-4 million units to accommodate the change in production lines.

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A modified version of the Facebook Messenger has revealed that person-to-person payment interfaces and other elements are already integrated into the app. The discovery was made by iOS developer Andre Aude.

Just like sending a message or sending a photo, Facebook’s payments implementation is integrated into the chat window. The idea being, that if you talk to a friend about getting coffee, you can pay your half of the bill in the same place. A history of payments appears in the settings pages.

Facebook has not confirmed that the feature is coming any time soon. Zuckerberg has floated the idea of Facebook tying mobile payments before, but warned it was a long way off.

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Need to learn how to replace your iPhone 6 or 6 Plus’s battery, display, or other components? Our friends over at iFixit, the same ones that regularly tear apart the newest devices to have a look inside, today published its latest iPhone repair guides for the recently released iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.
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What can I say about the iPhone 6 that you don’t know or haven’t already assumed? Not much, actually. It’s running iOS 8, has a great camera, thinner design, and a handful of features that make it different from last year’s iPhone.

This year, Apple has bumped up the display size and released two models. We have the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and 5.5-Inch iPhone 6 Plus, but if you were paying attention to the rumor mill leading up to the launch, these two models probably weren’t a surprise. That being said, there are still some points I’d like to make about both devices, but instead of creating two reviews, I think it’s safe to combine them so that you can find out which one is right for you…

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Yesterday, Chinese iPhone 6 reservations were stated as 2 million in six hours, a rather stunning statistic. Today, an update from the Chinese media press Tencent now says that reservations have topped 4 million. If all these reservations convert into orders, China alone may beat out the iPhone 6’s launch numbers, which — at the time — were considered to be impressive.

What’s more interesting is that Tencent claims it has exact order numbers from one of the main companies offering reservations. This gives some insight into how sales will be split between the 4.7 inch iPhone 6 and the 5.5 inch iPhone 6 Plus.

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