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The unattributed quotes in the story say a lot. Apple employees with that level of information don't have casual, off the cuff, and not-for-attribution conversa

The unattributed quotes in the story say a lot. Apple employees with that level of information don't have casual, off the cuff, and not-for-attribution conversations with Journalists by mistake or by accident. I suspect this was a purposeful and controlled leak.

boombip 9y ago
To what end? A shot across the bows of screen manufacturers? I suppose that's possible, to try and force screen manufacturers (i.e. Samsung) to cooperate on production costs for existing screens. But that doesn't seem like a useful negotiating tactic to me and it would probably be more useful to keep this secret until scale manufacturing deals have been signed and work has started.
- ghfbjdhhv 9y ago
  It seems that having this kind of information out there would be of benefit to Apple in negotiations with screen manufacturers eg. it could make suppliers more willing to sign a long-term deal at lower rates than they might otherwise, due to the fear of being dumped in the future. Another potential purpose for such a leak would be to boost the stock price.
  - ckastner 9y ago
    A better negotiation position would have been my first guess, too. > The screens are far more difficult to produce than OLED displays, and the company almost killed the project a year or so ago [...] consumers will probably have to wait a few years before seeing the results. So the best-case scenario is that Apple finishes developing this technology in a few years, and the worst-case scenario is that they kill this development, which almost happened already. This could go either way both for Apple and for screen manufacturers. It only makes sense to explore an option without all this uncertainty, by seeking a new middle ground.
  - joezydeco 9y ago
    It would also create a bidding war to be the approved company to scale this up to production levels. Apple may be prototyping a dozen screens at a time, but they'll let someone else build the factory to produce millions a year.
- sebiol 9y ago
  To me it depends. You might not actually want to produce your own screens, or what ever else you currently buy instead of making it yourself. Because that would require dedicated resources, diverted from your core competencies. But you might have someone, or a small team, look into it. Work out what you might need to do, what it is going to cost. Then you take that research and knock on your suppliers door and ask for a better price. I'm not saying that is what is happening here, but it could be a viable negotiation strategy.
- simonh 9y ago
  Apple has frequently used exclusive advanced screen technology as a differentiating factor in their products. Retina displays, better colour fidelity, wide colour gamut, 5K, etc. Previously they have done so by working together with screen manufacturers and underwriting the development of such technologies, the tool chains and manufacturing buildout with massive (Bns of dollar) loans, but actually owning the patents, tool chain and manufacturing gives them even more control and exclusivity.
- gutnor 9y ago
  Samsung stock did take a hit as a result of this. Another possibility is a fabricated leak for a pump and dump style scheme. Seems indeed very little interest for Apple. I'm sure any effect of a public leak can be as efficiently done with regular phone call. By shear size, Apple is very close to all its providers, the "pride and prejudice" drama is creative license of the media to animate what is mostly regular boring corporate interactions.
addicted 9y ago
I don't know whether this is a purposeful leak or not but there are several reasons Apple may want to. Besides the ones others have mentioned a few other are: 1) Part of being an Apple fan is the steady stream of rumors that keep people excited. Even if they don't pan out. So keeping the fan base interested. 2) Apple, unlike its competitors does not reveal its research unless it has a product to sell. This often leads to accusations of being less innovative than others. This helps maintajn the impression that they are an innovative company the way releasing proof of concepts or innovative, yet unsuccessful, products work for its competitors. 3) This may lead competitors into wild goose chase a especially if Apple has determined that it's a technology that isn't going anywhere 4) It may prod suppliers into investing in researching such technologies. If they know that Apple is interested in a technology, it gives every screen manufacturer a huge incentive to put a lot of money into research that may lead to a product that Apple could just buy. (To be fair, it wiuld probably be easier to just tell the suppliers that they are interested in this).
- simonh 9y ago
  I don't buy any of that. The population of Apple customers that hang on leaks like this is relatively tiny and if they're that much of a fan they're hooked anyway. Minor leaks are going to happen whatever Apple does, so manufacturing them just isn't worthwhile. Then there's the problem that it's impossible to control the narrative on off the record leaks, and once you leak a supposedly 'desirable' amount of information on a secret project, that's like blood in the water to the media sharks that will then savage the subject to death trying to get 'undesirable' amounts of information on it. The risks from that IMHO would massively outweigh the minuscule and highly arguable benefits from a minor leak. Small leaks have a tendency to turn into big leaks and Apple definitely doesn't want that to happen.
vsc 9y ago
>> Apple employees with that level of information don't have .... How can you say so? Can you back your statement up with some evidence or are you just saying what you've heard in folklore stories??
ksec 9y ago
I suspect this is the case here as well. Mark has never been quite accurate when it comes to hardware leaks, compared to Ming. My guess is all these are intentional from Apple, for a few reasons. OLED is expensive. I think Apple has learned its lesson with NAND, ( Where its projected NAND and SSD market cost does not align with reality ), Sharp does not yet have an OLED that is competitive, they are focusing on a different type of OLED technology that is much cheaper to manufacture, Ink Jet Print style OLED, one of the original promise of OLED was being even cheaper then LCD. But its quality is not on par with Samsung. Credit where Credit's due Samsung make amazing progress with AMOLED technology, if you think in the few years time what they have manage to achieve is uncanny. S9 now has the best possible display compared to even professional monitors. The only possible improvement left are brightness, power, price and longevity. Apart from Price, the other three will likely see improvement in Note 9, and more so in next iPhone. Samsung has been able to improve its OLED technology with every iteration twice or somecase three times every year. Apple is paying up to $100 a pc to Samsung for every OLED display. And if you include NAND & DRAM, which is extremely profitable in the last 2 years that is why people joke Samsung make more money selling components to Apple then selling its phone. While not entirely correct it is certainly not baseless. One reason why Apple will never move back to Samsung Fabs is to avoid putting too much egg in one basket. Despite the consistent rumours, which I guess is another play for TSMC to lower their price. Apple has literally NO other choice in OLED the market. As much as LG and BOE wants the business from Apple, both do not (yet) have the technology and capacity to output something similar to Samsung. Certainly not in this year's iPhone. I once written off BOE being far too early in the game, but it turns out BOE isn't far off, and are making much better progress. Compared to LG which I have no idea what they are doing in terms of Mobile Display. They seems to have difficulty getting it right, meanwhile their own WOLED display are much better. That is why I think the rumoured Apple investment in LG Display plant might have more to do with bigger WOLED screens then Smart Display. I think the larger 6.x" iPhone X Plus is pretty much guarantee this year. That display panel is going to be even more expensive. My problem with MicroLED is that it is still very much a fantasy, at least in terms of high PPI, mobile display panels. The MicroLED shown by Samsung "Wall" and Sony are completely different thing. When people talk about Mass-Transfer being the biggest obstacle, I have yet to see a single 600ppi+ MicroLED display that have said to solve their ultra low power passing through each and every pixel, being energy efficient as advertise, and brighter then LCD. ( Do Correct me If I am wrong ) Once they solve that, or at least being good enough to compared to OLED, they will have to solve Mass-transfer as well. Or using possibly other innovative method to mass manufacture. I wrote in 2015 MicroLED isn't going to happen as rumoured at the time for 2017, I wrote even 2018 is a bit of stretch given the best case scenario possible, and now as we stand my guess is that even 2020 seems unlikely. ( And I got Attacked by Apple Fans every time i said that, no wonder why some groups of people hate Apple's cult so much ) The good news is Apple is back on track again spending big in R&D. [1] So I hope I am wrong this time around. [1] https://www.aboveavalon.com/notes/2018/3/15/an-apple-rd-bonanza https://www.aboveavalon.com/notes/2018/3/15/an-apple-rd-bona...
GeekyBear 9y ago
The lead author has long been acknowledged to have excellent sources within Apple. https://www.recode.net/2016/6/1/11835514/bloomberg-mark-gurman-apple-scoop https://www.recode.net/2016/6/1/11835514/bloomberg-mark-gurm... Then there is Ming-Chi Kuo who has excellent sources inside Apple's supply chain. The difference being that Gurman hears about things that Apple is working on, while Ming-Chi would be more likely to know about which of those things are going to be built at scale.

boombip 9y ago

To what end? A shot across the bows of screen manufacturers? I suppose that's possible, to try and force screen manufacturers (i.e. Samsung) to cooperate on production costs for existing screens. But that doesn't seem like a useful negotiating tactic to me and it would probably be more useful to keep this secret until scale manufacturing deals have been signed and work has started.

ghfbjdhhv 9y ago
It seems that having this kind of information out there would be of benefit to Apple in negotiations with screen manufacturers eg. it could make suppliers more willing to sign a long-term deal at lower rates than they might otherwise, due to the fear of being dumped in the future. Another potential purpose for such a leak would be to boost the stock price.
- ckastner 9y ago
  A better negotiation position would have been my first guess, too. > The screens are far more difficult to produce than OLED displays, and the company almost killed the project a year or so ago [...] consumers will probably have to wait a few years before seeing the results. So the best-case scenario is that Apple finishes developing this technology in a few years, and the worst-case scenario is that they kill this development, which almost happened already. This could go either way both for Apple and for screen manufacturers. It only makes sense to explore an option without all this uncertainty, by seeking a new middle ground.
- joezydeco 9y ago
  It would also create a bidding war to be the approved company to scale this up to production levels. Apple may be prototyping a dozen screens at a time, but they'll let someone else build the factory to produce millions a year.
sebiol 9y ago
To me it depends. You might not actually want to produce your own screens, or what ever else you currently buy instead of making it yourself. Because that would require dedicated resources, diverted from your core competencies. But you might have someone, or a small team, look into it. Work out what you might need to do, what it is going to cost. Then you take that research and knock on your suppliers door and ask for a better price. I'm not saying that is what is happening here, but it could be a viable negotiation strategy.
simonh 9y ago
Apple has frequently used exclusive advanced screen technology as a differentiating factor in their products. Retina displays, better colour fidelity, wide colour gamut, 5K, etc. Previously they have done so by working together with screen manufacturers and underwriting the development of such technologies, the tool chains and manufacturing buildout with massive (Bns of dollar) loans, but actually owning the patents, tool chain and manufacturing gives them even more control and exclusivity.
gutnor 9y ago
Samsung stock did take a hit as a result of this. Another possibility is a fabricated leak for a pump and dump style scheme. Seems indeed very little interest for Apple. I'm sure any effect of a public leak can be as efficiently done with regular phone call. By shear size, Apple is very close to all its providers, the "pride and prejudice" drama is creative license of the media to animate what is mostly regular boring corporate interactions.

addicted 9y ago

I don't know whether this is a purposeful leak or not but there are several reasons Apple may want to. Besides the ones others have mentioned a few other are: 1) Part of being an Apple fan is the steady stream of rumors that keep people excited. Even if they don't pan out. So keeping the fan base interested. 2) Apple, unlike its competitors does not reveal its research unless it has a product to sell. This often leads to accusations of being less innovative than others. This helps maintajn the impression that they are an innovative company the way releasing proof of concepts or innovative, yet unsuccessful, products work for its competitors. 3) This may lead competitors into wild goose chase a especially if Apple has determined that it's a technology that isn't going anywhere 4) It may prod suppliers into investing in researching such technologies. If they know that Apple is interested in a technology, it gives every screen manufacturer a huge incentive to put a lot of money into research that may lead to a product that Apple could just buy. (To be fair, it wiuld probably be easier to just tell the suppliers that they are interested in this).

simonh 9y ago
I don't buy any of that. The population of Apple customers that hang on leaks like this is relatively tiny and if they're that much of a fan they're hooked anyway. Minor leaks are going to happen whatever Apple does, so manufacturing them just isn't worthwhile. Then there's the problem that it's impossible to control the narrative on off the record leaks, and once you leak a supposedly 'desirable' amount of information on a secret project, that's like blood in the water to the media sharks that will then savage the subject to death trying to get 'undesirable' amounts of information on it. The risks from that IMHO would massively outweigh the minuscule and highly arguable benefits from a minor leak. Small leaks have a tendency to turn into big leaks and Apple definitely doesn't want that to happen.

vsc 9y ago

>> Apple employees with that level of information don't have .... How can you say so? Can you back your statement up with some evidence or are you just saying what you've heard in folklore stories??

ksec 9y ago

I suspect this is the case here as well. Mark has never been quite accurate when it comes to hardware leaks, compared to Ming. My guess is all these are intentional from Apple, for a few reasons. OLED is expensive. I think Apple has learned its lesson with NAND, ( Where its projected NAND and SSD market cost does not align with reality ), Sharp does not yet have an OLED that is competitive, they are focusing on a different type of OLED technology that is much cheaper to manufacture, Ink Jet Print style OLED, one of the original promise of OLED was being even cheaper then LCD. But its quality is not on par with Samsung. Credit where Credit's due Samsung make amazing progress with AMOLED technology, if you think in the few years time what they have manage to achieve is uncanny. S9 now has the best possible display compared to even professional monitors. The only possible improvement left are brightness, power, price and longevity. Apart from Price, the other three will likely see improvement in Note 9, and more so in next iPhone. Samsung has been able to improve its OLED technology with every iteration twice or somecase three times every year. Apple is paying up to $100 a pc to Samsung for every OLED display. And if you include NAND & DRAM, which is extremely profitable in the last 2 years that is why people joke Samsung make more money selling components to Apple then selling its phone. While not entirely correct it is certainly not baseless. One reason why Apple will never move back to Samsung Fabs is to avoid putting too much egg in one basket. Despite the consistent rumours, which I guess is another play for TSMC to lower their price. Apple has literally NO other choice in OLED the market. As much as LG and BOE wants the business from Apple, both do not (yet) have the technology and capacity to output something similar to Samsung. Certainly not in this year's iPhone. I once written off BOE being far too early in the game, but it turns out BOE isn't far off, and are making much better progress. Compared to LG which I have no idea what they are doing in terms of Mobile Display. They seems to have difficulty getting it right, meanwhile their own WOLED display are much better. That is why I think the rumoured Apple investment in LG Display plant might have more to do with bigger WOLED screens then Smart Display. I think the larger 6.x" iPhone X Plus is pretty much guarantee this year. That display panel is going to be even more expensive. My problem with MicroLED is that it is still very much a fantasy, at least in terms of high PPI, mobile display panels. The MicroLED shown by Samsung "Wall" and Sony are completely different thing. When people talk about Mass-Transfer being the biggest obstacle, I have yet to see a single 600ppi+ MicroLED display that have said to solve their ultra low power passing through each and every pixel, being energy efficient as advertise, and brighter then LCD. ( Do Correct me If I am wrong ) Once they solve that, or at least being good enough to compared to OLED, they will have to solve Mass-transfer as well. Or using possibly other innovative method to mass manufacture. I wrote in 2015 MicroLED isn't going to happen as rumoured at the time for 2017, I wrote even 2018 is a bit of stretch given the best case scenario possible, and now as we stand my guess is that even 2020 seems unlikely. ( And I got Attacked by Apple Fans every time i said that, no wonder why some groups of people hate Apple's cult so much ) The good news is Apple is back on track again spending big in R&D. [1] So I hope I am wrong this time around. [1] https://www.aboveavalon.com/notes/2018/3/15/an-apple-rd-bonanza https://www.aboveavalon.com/notes/2018/3/15/an-apple-rd-bona...

GeekyBear 9y ago

The lead author has long been acknowledged to have excellent sources within Apple. https://www.recode.net/2016/6/1/11835514/bloomberg-mark-gurman-apple-scoop https://www.recode.net/2016/6/1/11835514/bloomberg-mark-gurm... Then there is Ming-Chi Kuo who has excellent sources inside Apple's supply chain. The difference being that Gurman hears about things that Apple is working on, while Ming-Chi would be more likely to know about which of those things are going to be built at scale.