Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) primary supplier of finished iPhones, Foxconn of Taiwan and mainland China, is said to be on the verge of starting mass production of the 4.7 inch version of the iPhone 6 this coming week. Though this information is only a rumor, it is a plausible one given that manufacture of the smartphone must commence at some point, and the midpoint of the year is already past, leaving just a few weeks if a September release is still in the cards.
The much-awaited launch of the larger model of Apple’s popular iPhone form factor is to be backed up by the manufacturing capacity of Foxconn and Pegatron, two of the Cupertino company’s principal Asian suppliers. The same news source, the Economic Daily News in Taiwan, also states that production of the 5.5 inch iPhone model, the so-called “phablet,” will begin in the second week of August, just under a month from now.
Investors and Apple enthusiasts alike have been impatiently awaiting the release of Apple’s next iPhone iteration, while becoming frustrated by constant rumors of delays from various analysts and “inside sources.” Some have gone so far as to assert that the 5.5 inch version’s launch will be pushed back to early 2015. The Economic Daily News bucks this “doom and gloom” trend, but thus far, there is no concrete data to support any of the proposed release dates.
The hiring sprees at Foxconn and Pegatron are a matter of public record, however, and it seems unlikely that the former would add 100,000 additional workers to their payrolls, and the latter 10,000, if they were not on the brink of starting mass production of an unprecented number of devices. Besides this major indicator, Foxconn is adding 10,000 “Foxbots” to its production lineup, a move that could cost up to a quarter billion dollars.
The Foxbots, it would seem, are meant to augment the efforts of human workers rather than supplanting them, as was initially believed. This is obviously good news for those earning their salaries through iPhone production, but it also a strong hint at the unprecedented scale of iPhone 6 production. Of course, Apple (AAPL) clearly expects many upgrade purchases from existing customers who want to replace their smaller, older iPhones with the big new displays that are set to rival the oversized handsets of competitors like Samsung.
