MAC ROUMORS

Apple supplier Foxconn could be about to land a large number of additional MacBook orders this year, according to upstream supply chain sources (via DigiTimes). The increase could come at the expense of Quanta Computer, which has been Apple’s major MacBook manufacturer in recent years.

Taiwan-based Foxconn has reportedly been working to boost its chances of notebook orders from Apple by offering attractive quotes, while Apple has not majorly upgraded its MacBook range since 2016’s Touch Bar MacBook Pros, and is said to have no plan for one in 2018. Apple will therefore switch MacBook orders to Foxconn for models that are already in mass production as a way to save costs and reduce risks, according to the sources.

Foxconn is expected to begin mass shipments to fulfill the new orders in the second quarter of 2018, said the sources. Foxconn and Quanta both declined to comment on their clients or orders. The sources pointed out that Apple started outsourcing the assembly for some of MacBooks’ components to Foxconn’s plants in Shenzhen, China in the second half of 2017.

Despite the news, Quanta is expected to remain Apple’s biggest supplier going into 2018. According to DigiTimes’ research, out of around 15 million MacBooks shipped to Apple a year, the shipment ratio between Quanta and Foxconn has been at around 8:2 for the past five years. Last year alone, Quanta had a 79.5 percent share and Foxconn took 20.5 percent.

Quanta is said to be looking to other brand vendors to offset the impact of the loss of orders, as it aims for similar growth to the market average in 2018. The Taiwan-based firm shipped 38.7 million notebooks last year, up 5 percent on year, and is currently the largest notebook supplier for Hewlett-Packard (HP), Apple, Acer and Asustek Computer.

Quanta also maintains orders from Apple for Apple Watch, and is said to be teaming up with Israeli-based augmented reality company Lumus to manufacture lenses for smart glasses. It’s not clear if Quanta and Lumus are working with Apple on a future AR headset or smart glasses, but it is a possibility as rumors suggest Apple has a wearable augmented reality product in the works.

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Source: MAC ROUMORS