iPhone 13 mass production will not face iPhone 12-like delays - Report

Today, veteran tech analyst, Ming-Chi Kuo reports the next generation, iPhone 13 mass production will be as per schedule, without any delay like this year. Apple’s begins mass production of the upcoming iPhone models in summer for their September launch. However, COVID-19 related lockdown and travel restrictions hindered the development process and disrupted the supply chain and production of the iPhone 12 series. Thus, the new flagship smartphone models were announced in October, a month’s delay.

As per Kuo’s claim, if the alleged iPhone 13 will be in mass production in summer next year, then it can be said that Apple will launch the next-generation iPhone in September 2021, following its usual release time frame.

iPhone 13 will go into mass production without delay

In his new investor note, Kuo also dismissed the concerns of a 20% drop in TSMC’s capacity utilization rate for A14 Bionic chips in Q2 2021. He states that the decrease is due to seasonality factors and the Taiwanese manufacture would begin production of the next-generation A15 chip for the upcoming iPhone 13 series by that time. TSMC is Apple’s major supplier which manufactured the new A14 chip used in iPhone 12 line-up and the powerful 5nm M1 Apple Silicon for Mac.

He further added that the demand for iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max models is still very strong which is causing some supply chain shortages like camera components. A recent report by DigiTimes corroborates the news of an unexpected surge in iPhone 12 Pro models in the United States has pushed the delivery date a few weeks ahead.

Previously, Kuo reported that the new iPhone 13 will have four models like the current iPhone 12, and predicted that it will have higher sales than iPhone 12 due to better 5G network infrastructure. He also detailed that iPhone 13 Pro models will be equipped with an improved ultra-wide camera with a fast f1.8 lens with auto-focus.

In a separate report, Kuo claimed that the upcoming iPhone models will have smaller batteries because of a new ‘soft board batteries’ technology.

Benefiting from the return to Apple’s full product line soft board supply chain, we predict that Jialianyi’s Apple business revenue will grow by about 100% YoY or above in 2021.

Jialianyi is expected to obtain about 40-50% of orders for battery soft boards for iPhone 13 and 13 mini. We predict that iPhone 13 will be the first iPhone model to adopt battery soft board technology, which will help save internal space and reduce costs.

The battery soft and hard version suppliers for the iPhone 12 series include Xinxing, Huatong, Yaohua, and TTM, and the battery soft board suppliers for the iPhone 13 series are changed to Jialianyi, Xinxing, and Huatong.

The Elec, a Korean tech publisher, claimed that Apple will use low-temperature polycrystalline oxide (LPTO) display in the alleged iPhone 13 Pro models, coming in 2021.