According to a new report released Wednesday by DigiTimes, Pegatron will start shipping the new iPhone 5 handset to Apple in September. According to industry sources quoted in the report, Pegatron will move up to become the secondary original design manufacturer (or ‘ODM’) for the iPhone, with orders totaling 10 million units of Apple’s fifth-generation handset.
Other sources quoted in the report stated that Pegatron is moving to try to earn more work from Apple. Since Pegatron’s margins on iPhone handsets are “relatively small”, the company has retooled factories and trained up staff to try to earn some of Apple’s iPad and MacBook manufacturing business. The report indicates that Foxconn has worked with Apple to ensure that their relationship is strong and that the orders for Apple’s wildly selling iPhone and iPad models continue to come to Foxconn as the primary manufacturer.
Just a few weeks ago, DigiTimes released a report claiming that Pegatron had received an order from Apple for up to 15 million units of the iPhone 5. The most recent report reduced that number from 15 to 10 million handsets, which some may recall was the figure claimed by reports back in late January. As Pegatron is a very experienced manufacturing partner and has worked with major volumes in the past, hitting this 10 million mark likely won’t present too much of a challenge.
As we move closer to the expected launch and release dates for Apple’s next-generation iPhone handset, rumors and speculation abound about when the handset will actually end up in the hands of consumers. This week saw Canadian carrier Telus report that the iPhone 5 will launch in early October, a report backed up by All Things D; this news contradicts reports by China Times and many others that have indicated that Apple intends to release the next iPhone as early as September 6th. A September launch window was also proposed by Mike Abramsky, an analyst with RBC Capital Markets, with Abramsky stating that build data information that he had obtained from some of Apple’s suppliers has indicated a September launch.
One thing is clear – the launch of the next iPhone is getting close. Another report earlier this week stated that Apple had begun shipping the device to its many carrier partners for final testing. The handsets were shipped to the carriers locked and secured to ensure that no one got so much as a glimpse of what the next iPhone has in store for the many millions of consumers waiting on its release.
According to Shaw Wu, analyst with Sterne Agee, those waiting for the iPhone 5 could end up getting a “bigger upgrade than expected”. Wu claims that the next iPhone will ship with a thinner, lighter design, a larger screen, and the dual-core A5 processor that’s currently found powering the iPad 2. Wu continued that users should expect the iPhone 5 to have the same general form factor as the iPhone 4, but with a thinner bezel and most certainly a fix to the antenna issues that plagued the older handset. An upgraded rear camera is likely as well, taking the camera to 8 megapixels in resolution. What’s not expected is a ‘4G’ LTE radio, which likely won’t be found in an iPhone until the next models are released sometime in 2012.
As expected, Apple did not comment on any of this week’s news.
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