There's less than a week to go before reservations for the iPhone X open on Apple's website.
According to the Zhengzhou ZIPO Inspection and Quarantine Bureau, there are only 76,450 units of the first batch of the country-branded iPhone X. By way of comparison, there were 278,000 units of the iPhone 8 Plus in the first batch - a huge gap in production capacity.
From the latest analysis report by KGI Securities, the following are the main reasons for the iPhone X's production difficulties:
The "biggest obstacle" is the flexible printed circuit board (FPCB) on the iPhone X's antennae, which is a part that Apple requires quite a bit of rigor, and is even more demanding than that of the iPhone 8. Not only do we have to use special materials, but we also have strict specifications for the process, testing and other processes.
The printed circuit board (PCB) for the iPhone X wide-angle lens is also a big deal. Unlike Samsung and Huawei's dual-camera models, Apple customized special circuit boards for the wide-angle and telephoto lenses, respectively, which led to capacity issues with the custom PCB.
Another major hurdle is the "dot projector," the core component of Face ID, which is used to project tens of thousands of invisible points of light on a person's face, which in turn creates a depth map of the face. Previously, the iPhone X was stuck due to a lack of capacity for the dot projector.
Additionally, Apple COO Jeff Williams will fly to Taiwan this month to visit TSMC and Foxconn, where Williams will also discuss iPhone X production capacity issues with Foxconn chairman Terry Kuo. Sharp executives, who are responsible for producing the 3D sensors in the iPhone X, have said that while production capacity has improved, it's still not at a satisfactory level.
While mass production of the iPhone X has been difficult, it hasn't been entirely without breakthroughs. KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that Apple has now overcome the bottleneck of mass production of "dot matrix projectors," and shipments of the component will be much higher; in addition, the capacity problems of FPCBs and PCBs have also been solved by changing suppliers.
Ming-Chi Kuo speculated that by the time we get to launch, Apple will have about 2 million to 3 million units in stock. In the early days of the launch, the iPhone X may still be in a 'hard-to-find' situation, but as production capacity increases, iPhone X availability will grow by 50 percent by the first quarter of 2018.
Nevertheless, KGI Securities is still making a more conservative forecast, lowering iPhone shipments in the fourth quarter from 30 - 35 million to 25 - 30 million.
In fact, even if iPhone X stock reaches 3 million units, it's still a drop in the bucket for the market. At the moment, Jingdong Mall has already opened iPhone X reservations in advance, and it already has more than 1.2 million reservations.
Based on previous years' experience, the first weekend of a new iPhone's release has seen sales of around 10 million units. 2015 saw more than 13 million units of the iPhone 6s sold on the first weekend of its launch - 3 million worldwide. The iPhone X was in stock, and I'm afraid it was snapped up in a day.
Anyone who loves to chase the wind is sure to grab it.