Tag: iphone 6

Hon Hai profits soar

Posted on March 30, 2015 by - News

foxconn-tvHon Hai – a Taiwanese firm also known as Foxconn, said that its fourth quarter profits rose to $1.8 billion on the back of the success of Apple’s iPhone.

Hon Hai makes most of Apple’s iPhones and has been criticised in the past for harsh employment practices.

But Bloomberg estimates, based on yearly results filed on Taiex – the Taiwanese bourse today – is far higher than financial analysts originally estimated.

Bloomberg claims the profits have been generated by iPhone 6 phones, which saw a surge in sales since their launch in Autumn last year. It believes half of Foxconn’s revenues are generated by Apple business, although there’s no hard and fast evidence for that.

But while Hon Hai may have turned in a rather healthy profit, its operating margin was only about 4.2 percent. Generally speaking, Taiwanese manufacturers of electronic devices have very slim margins indeed – not anything like the kind of margins Apple itself generates.

Although Foxconn’s Terry Gou had forecast growth of 10 percent in its full financial year, the actual growth was only 6.6 percent, Bloomberg reports.

 

Apple’s bendy turkey now faces hair-gate

Posted on October 8, 2014 by - News

appleIt looks like Apple’s reputation for design success is hair today, gone tomorrow.

Already the iPhone 6 range has had to deal with the fact that its aluminium frame can be bent but now has to deal with the fact that its design pulls out the hair on your head and beard.

Twitter users have made #hairgate a rising social media trend.

The problem happens where the aluminium meets the glass which has a space which is ideal for catching hair and pulling it out.  If only there was a company which was famous for its design which did not make such basic mistakes.

Apparently Apple fanboys are divided as to whether treat #beardgate as a separate trend, or simply as a subset of #hairgate. Other Applefans cannot grow a beard and don’t care.

Apple has been refusing to comment about it. However, if its press office had been required to handle the Black Death it would have waited six months before claiming that it only affected a small number of people.

Apple’s silence is fuelling a range of gags. The Twitter account of the Atlanta International Fashion Week speculating that it may be an elaborate plot against hipsters for whom facial hair has become de rigeur. Another user tweeted: “Congrats, Apple, for finally getting hipsters to shave”.

Gillette posted: “Your phone may be smarter than ever, but leave the shaving to the experts.”

The tame Apple press is rushing to quote the standard Apple fanboys in denial posts instead.

“I have iPhone 6. Doesn’t bend and doesn’t snag hair. Who thinks up these things? Apple haters? Competitors?” tweeted John Wooten.

After all, who wants to be the idiot who spent a fortune on a phone so poorly designed it bends and rips your hair out. Only a complete moron would do that – so it is better to pretend you bought a great product, claim it is perfect and people will not laugh at you.

Apple’s design for an iWatch was also mocked by Swiss Watch Makers which said that it looked like it had been designed by a first year design student.

Tame Apple Press claims Bendgate is a conspiracy theory

Posted on October 1, 2014 by - News

truthDesperate to keep Apple afloat after it released a phone which was easy to bend and break, the Tame Apple Press is actually releasing stories claiming it is all a conspiracy theory “on a par to 9/11.”

BGR  insists that all the videos  you see where the phone is being bent are all doctored, just like the moon landings.  If you are dumb, enough to think that Americans walked on the moon then you are stupid enough to think an iPhone bends, apparently.

It was especially sure that this video, which bends the iPhone 6 Plus so easily that we actually do have a hard time believing the device wasn’t doctored somehow beforehand.

Another video made by Lewis “Unbox Therapy” Hilstenteger’s original video was a fake because of time discrepancies. The time shown from earlier in the video before the phone was bent is later than the time shown in the video after the phone was bent.

However Hilstenteger said that he had to reshoot part of the video because of glare problems, but that is just what “they want you to think.”

BGR reports that fans think that Samsung has hatched an international conspiracy so vast that it’s paid lots of YouTube users to fake bending their iPhones in the exact same way.

To be fair, BGR does say that “obsessing over the nuances of the bent iPhone 6 Plus [videos] in the same way conspiracy theorists obsess over grassy knolls and moon landing videos” is nutty. However, the question is why are the Tame Apple Press unable to accept that Jobs’ Mob made a design flaw?

Why would respectable technology magazines actually try to bury the news that a phone is faulty instead of warning its readers about the problem. So far there is a lot of empiratic evidence that the iPhone6 and iPhone 6+ is structurally weak and susceptible to bending.  It is fairly clear that the conspiracy is not to tell lies about Apple, but to bury the truth which is already out there.

China clamps down on iPhone smugglers

Posted on September 29, 2014 by - News, Products

gala_appleApple is not set to launch its iPhone 6 family in mainland China for a while, but that’s just created a smuggling racket as crooks try to cash in on demand for the devices.

According to the Taipei Times, crooks are selling imported iPhone 6s for as much as $3,000 – but authorities have made several seizures of the machines in the last week.

Some have tried to import the iPhones by using speedboats into mangrove swamps while others have taken the more direct route of stuffing their suitcases with contraband Apple phones.

The same report said that “hundreds” of devices had been taken from passengers who sought to import a phone without declaring them.

Greed for Apple iPhones is apparently so high that authorities are suggesting that people despise rather than envy those who have one of the overpriced devices.  The Taipei Times report is here.

iPhone 6 Plus only costs $215 to make

Posted on September 24, 2014 by - News

blue-appleA unit at research company IHS has torn apart an iPhone 6 Plus and shows that though you’ll have to pay $100 more to buy 0.8 inches of screen, it only costs Apple $16 more to make.

That gives Apple an even bigger margin on this model than on others. That will please Apple shareholders.

The bill of materials of an iPhone 6 with 16HB of memory is $196.10, and the additional screen size makes the bill of materials $215.60.

Andrew Rassweiler, a senior director at IHS, said: “Apple has always been adept at offering higher end iPhone models with enhanced desirable features and then pricing those versions for maximum profitability.

“In the past, the premium versions of iPhone offered higher memory configurations for additional profit. While Apple continues this memory strategy, the company is also taking a similar with the iPhone Plus, structuring its pricing to add bottom line profits on models that have a very desirable feature: a large phablet sized display.”

IHS thinks that Apple is second sourcing the microprocessor, the A8, between TSMC and Samsung factories.  The A8 chip in these latest models costs $20, compared to $17 for the previous versions that used an Apple A7 chip.

Here’s a breakdown of the component costs for the iPhone 5S and the new phones, courtesy of IHS:
Bill of materials iPhone 6 Plus

Apple claims sales record for iPhone 6

Posted on September 22, 2014 by - News, Products

Apple's Tim CookGizmo firm Apple claimed it sold over 10 million iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus phones in the three days after it was launched by CEO Tim Cook. (pictured)

The phones are available in the UK, Singapore, Puerto Rico, Japan, Hong Kong, Germany, France, Canada, Australia and the USA – and will be sold in 20 more countries on September 26th.

Cook said that while there are supply constraints on the iPhone 6, the launch is Apple’s best ever.

The phones uses Apple’s A8 chip which is a 64 bit microprocessor, touch app Apple Pay and 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch retina HD displays.

The phones also come with an upgrade to the operating system, iOS 8, which offers new features including predictive typing and a Health app.

Apple is using its familiar trick of charging quite a bit extra depending on the memory. In the US, for example the magic figure is a $100 hike between the 16GB, 64GB and 128GB models.

Kids think Apple is smug

Posted on September 11, 2014 by - News

blue-appleA survey claimed that only one in 10 American schoolkids are interested in the recently announced Apple iWatch.

The survey, conducted by Chegg, also reveals that Apple doesn’t hold the allure for college and high school kids it formerly had.

Seventy one percent of these students think Google is “cool” while only 64 percent think that Apple is “cool”.

And 29 percent think that Apple is smug.

They also believe that Apple has been hyped up the US press, with 24 percent believing the firm may have lost its edge.  Over half of those surveyed described the iPhone 6 as “more stle than substance”.

So what do the kids want?  Acording to the survey they want phones with better battery life, more memory, and that are waterproof and durable.

Chegg surveyed 1,586 college students and 446 high school students between August 30th and the Apple introductions earlier this week.

A survey claimed that only one in 10 American schoolkids are interested in the recently announced Apple iWatch.

The survey, conducted by Chegg, also reveals that Apple doesn’t hold the allure for college and high school kids it formerly had.

Seventy one percent of these students think Google is “cool” while only 64 percent think that Apple is “cool”.

And 29 percent think that Apple is smug.

They also believe that Apple has been hyped up the US press, with 24 percent believing the firm may have lost its edge.  Over half of those surveyed described the iPhone 6 as “more stle than substance”.

So what do the kids want?  Acording to the survey they want phones with better battery life, more memory, and that are waterproof and durable.

Chegg surveyed 1,586 college students and 446 high school students between August 30th and the Apple introductions earlier this week.

Apple faces iPhone 6 supply problems

Posted on August 25, 2014 by - News

gala_appleIt has not even launched yet but the iPhone 6 is already causing a few headaches for the fruity purveyor of expensive toys, Apple.

Word on the street is that Apple cannot get enough screens ready for the new iPhone 6 smartphone because at the last minute it needed to redesign a key component.

The product was due to be announced next month and would be Apple’s first significant product launch in a while. The tame apple press are calling the problems a “hiccup” and are uncertain if this could delay the launch or limit the number of phones initially available to consumers.

Two supply chain sources said display panel production suffered a setback after the backlight that helps illuminate the screen had to be revised, putting screen assembly on hold for part of June and July.

Apple, wanted to cut back to a single layer of backlight film, instead of the standard two layers, for the 4.7-inch screen, which went into mass production ahead of the 5.5-inch version.

But the new configuration was not bright enough and the backlight was sent back to the drawing board to fit in the extra layer, costing precious time and temporarily idling some screen assembly operations.

A delay however would be a nightmare for Apple which wants larger-screen iPhones for the year-end shopping season to match those of its much cheaper rivals.

This is the second time that the iPhone 6 has had problems with its screen. Earlier there were reports of another screen technology problem, since resolved, in making thinner screens for the larger iPhone 6 model.

The fruity cargo cult is planning one of its Nuremburg rallies for the faithful in Cupertino on September 9. At this event many of the US’s finest technology writers are enthusiastically willing to sacrifice any shred of credibility they may have by standing up and cheering when Tim Cook releases a product which is more or less the same as everything else on the market.

Apple is expected to unveil the new iPhone 6 with both 4.7 inch and 5.5 inch screens – bigger than the 4-inch screen on the iPhone 5s and 5c, but about industry standard for Android phones.

 

Hype begins for new iPhone

Posted on July 18, 2014 by - News

gala_appleIt seems that the fruity cargo cult Apple has started the hype for the launch of its new iPhone.

While other outfits have to pay for their advertising, Apple manages to attract huge attention for its product launches thanks to its fans in key newspapers.

This morning it was “leaked” that Hon Hai has begun mass production of Apple next-generation iPhone.

You can tell if a story has been written with the idea of marketing Apple products on the sly, because they are full of marketing phrases such as “game changing” and “wildly popular.”

While the worst offender is traditionally the New York Times, Reuters has also sacrificed its credibility with unethical marketing plugs.

This morning, someoneat Reuters wrote this:

“Mass production of a 4.7-inch successor to the wildly popular iPhone 5 series of smartphones will begin during the third week of July.” Firstly, the iPhone 5 was not “wildly popular” in comparison to other smartphones, secondly the 4.7 inch screen size is pretty backward.

So far the so called “next-generation” iPhone appears to be thinner than the earlier models but has no especially interesting software, in fact it will be playing catch-up until a 5.5 inch model is released later.

It does seem clear that manufacturing of the latest iPhone has begun. A report from a China state-run news service said Hon Hai is planning to hire 100,000 workers.  Of course Apple’s Tame Apple press suggest this will be to “meet future demand for the gadget.”

Pegatron also began recruitment of over 10,000 workers for its mainland facilities to manufacture the phone, according to the Economic Daily News report.

This hype  is going to get worse until the first queues start to form outside the Apple cathedrals of delight. But with mass production started, the chance of a leak is much higher and we will soon know what it looks like.