iPhone launch may be delayed until end of year

Whereas eager early adopters might have been excited to pick up one of Apple’s new flagship smartphones in the fall, but reports from China say that the curved OLED display on the iPhone 8 is causing manufacturing to fall behind schedule. This may mean that Apple will push back the new iPhones until October or November. Digitimes is basing this information off of a Chinese report in the Economic Daily News, but this has yet to be corroborated by other sources.

Sources are closely watching the supply chain to look for pull-in orders for components, which provide a clue as to whether the new iPhones are being assembled at the expected rate. Among the companies providing components to the iPhone include Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Cyntec, Foxconn Electronics, Largan Precision, Pegatron Technology, TSMC, Wistron, and Yageo.

Apple expects to sell upward of 70 million new iPhones this year and has placed an order for a similar number of OLED panels from Samsung, suggesting the company is confident that their customers will be clamoring for the new device. A lot of hopes are riding on the redesigned iPhone to generate more demand as 2016 marked the first time the device’s sales fell since the first iPhone was released in 2007.

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