iPhone 14 Spotted in India: Is Apple Planning to Cut-off China from Manufacturing?
It looks like iPhone 14 production is going to start in India and China simultaneously. This means that production will significantly improve the early availability of this year’s lineup. However, a new report that came out today suggests otherwise. What does the report actually state?
Signs of Early Availability
A new report on the iPhone 14 production hinted toward an early availability of the product. However, according to a new report, Apple will abandon any hope of achieving this. Certainly, challenges in the supply chain were a major obstacle. However, Apple felt it would be impossible to achieve the same level of secrecy in India as it does in China.
To date, Apple has been making slow progress toward decreasing its dependency on China for manufacturing. Moreover, the initiative has increased as the threat of disruption in China and Taiwan has become more real.
iPhone 14 Production in India
Coming to India, Apple has made the most progress. Initially, only the iPhone SE was initially assembled there. However, the range of models has gradually expanded—with the iPhone 13 joining the lineup earlier in 2022. While Foxconn is Apple’s lead supplier in the country, responsible for all of the iPhone 13 production, Wistron makes the iPhone SE and iPhone 12.
Moreover, a device that looked something like the iPhone 14 was spotted in the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS).
According to a report by MySmartPrice, the device was filed under the model number “A2882”. Speculators believe it to correspond to one of the standard iPhone 14 models. The iPhone 13 model numbers are A2482, A2631, A2634, A2635, and A2633. Therefore, this is the very first time someone officially saw the new model.
What could this mean?
The recent spotting hints that the launch is imminent. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is planning to launch the iPhone 14 lineup on September 7, on a Wednesday event. According to Gurman, Apple will begin the iPhone 14 production in India two months after shipping the first waves of devices out of China. This is because manufacturing partners attempt to replicate the complex iPhone supply chain operation in another country for the very first time.
In addition to that, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that iPhone 14 production will begin simultaneously in India and China. Moreover, the latest report says that the most ambitious target now is for iPhone 14 production to begin in India in late October. So, what could this entire fiasco mean?
Anwesha has been a creative writer for a while. Currently, on her pursuit of tech writing, she is diving into the realms of technology to produce better content on the forever-changing world of technology. In her free time, you’ll find her humming tunes of her favourite shows or reading a book.