Apple reportedly taps Samsung to supply 5.5" OLED iPhone panels in 2017
Riding on the back of rumors that Apple plans to make the switch to OLED display technology, a report on Thursday claims Samsung has won a three-year contract to supply the iPhone maker with 5.5-inch panels starting in 2017.
Citing sources familiar with the matter, The Korea Herald reports Samsung's display manufacturing arm will provide Apple with 100 million 5.5-inch OLED panels per year in a deal worth $2.59 billion. Details of the arrangement are scarce, but industry watchers believe the contract will run for at least three years.
Today's report jibes with a rumor from early March that claimed Apple reached out to both LG and Samsung to discuss the viability of ramping up OLED production for a 2017 iPhone model. As the world's two leading suppliers of OLED panels, LG and Samsung are clear choices for Apple, which needs reliable production at scale to meet the demands of its customers. In December, a report suggested Apple would likely look to the two Korean companies for initial orders.
Apple has long been rumored to move its flagship smartphone product away from LCD displays, but OLED suppliers lack the production capacity required to keep pace with brisk iPhone sales. Parts makers are taking notice, however, as LG last year announced plans to build out an advanced OLED plant, and in January was said to be ramping up curved panel production for 2017.
Samsung's supposed contribution of 5.5-inch panels does not line up with predictions from noted insider Ming-Chi Kuo, who last month said Apple would market a 5.8-inch AMOLED iPhone as part of next year's lineup. Taking on a "glass sandwich" design reminiscent of iPhone 4/4s, the 2017 handset is expected to feature both a curved front and back.
Kuo said the 5.8-inch AMOLED model will either be tacked on to Apple's existing 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhone formats, or completely replace the 5.5-inch TFT-LCD model, depending on supply.
Citing sources familiar with the matter, The Korea Herald reports Samsung's display manufacturing arm will provide Apple with 100 million 5.5-inch OLED panels per year in a deal worth $2.59 billion. Details of the arrangement are scarce, but industry watchers believe the contract will run for at least three years.
Today's report jibes with a rumor from early March that claimed Apple reached out to both LG and Samsung to discuss the viability of ramping up OLED production for a 2017 iPhone model. As the world's two leading suppliers of OLED panels, LG and Samsung are clear choices for Apple, which needs reliable production at scale to meet the demands of its customers. In December, a report suggested Apple would likely look to the two Korean companies for initial orders.
Apple has long been rumored to move its flagship smartphone product away from LCD displays, but OLED suppliers lack the production capacity required to keep pace with brisk iPhone sales. Parts makers are taking notice, however, as LG last year announced plans to build out an advanced OLED plant, and in January was said to be ramping up curved panel production for 2017.
Samsung's supposed contribution of 5.5-inch panels does not line up with predictions from noted insider Ming-Chi Kuo, who last month said Apple would market a 5.8-inch AMOLED iPhone as part of next year's lineup. Taking on a "glass sandwich" design reminiscent of iPhone 4/4s, the 2017 handset is expected to feature both a curved front and back.
Kuo said the 5.8-inch AMOLED model will either be tacked on to Apple's existing 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhone formats, or completely replace the 5.5-inch TFT-LCD model, depending on supply.
Comments
Mainly there are two concerns: Battery life, and Screen life/quality. Currently AMOLED's wear out extremely quickly, if they're don't maintain 80% of the quality in 7 years, then they're not worth switching to. If the battery life isn't improved by at least 20% in the switch, then it also isn't worth it.
I have an OLED screened phone I have been using for 6 years and I would be extremely unusual in using a phone for that long. Why do you say an OLED screened phone has to last 7 years. How many people are still using a 3GS?
Anyway, you and Foggyhill are just going to have do some serious BSing and backpedaling when the OLED screened iPhones do arrive to switch to claiming they are now obviously superior to current LCDs, because Apple are now using them. I have a few theories about what rationale will be used to explain why AMOLEDs were inferior when Samsung were featuring them in their flagship devices but Apple fairy dust suddenly makes them superior.
Apple will never go OLED - right, so what type of display does the Watch use? Apple has no LCD business. They don't manufacture stuff so can just buy whatever they think is best for their products.
OLED phones have gigantic batteries so they can last longer between charges. When I bought my Samsung Wave with its 3.5" OLED screen, the equivalent Apple phone was the iP4. The Wave had a 1500 mah battery while the iP4 had a 1420 mah battery. They both used pretty much the same processor, Samsungs's Hummingbird, which Apple used a very slight variation of they dubbed the A4. 2G standby time of my Wave - 600 hours. 2g standby time of the iP4 - 300 hours. 3G standby time of the Wave - 550 hours vs 300 for the iP4.
The Wave had the best battery life of any phone as tested by GSM Arena, for years until it was finally dethroned.
http://blog.gsmarena.com/the-king-is-dead-long-live-the-king-samsung-s8500-wave-is-the-new-battery-life-champion/
When the battery was new, I used to only have to charge it once a week, sometimes twice if I was using it more than normal.
So there goes that little misconception of yours.
Imagine how many 4.7 inch iPhones a single 27 inch iMac LCD screen is equal to, add to this all the other iMacs, Thunderbolt displays, MacBooks and iPads and educate again your guess on the cost of a unit LCD to Apple... Oled vendors have a long way to go to sell their tech to Apple...
- 90 minutes of video playback
- 2 hours music playback through loudspeaker
- 40 minutes voice call
- 20 minutes games
- 50 minutes browsing
- 30 minutes general usage
- 10 minutes navigation
- 20 minutes shooting photos and videos
Your so full of shit. The iPhone 4 blew that away. Add those times up; 6.3 hours of use. Brilliant! /sIt sucks as a phone, but it has great standby time!! Only gsmarena would get palpitations over that.
OLED is superior to conventional LCD. Every time I see a Samsung Galaxy S7, I lust after the display.
JDI and Sharp have failed. Their LCD display technology is interior to the best that LG and Samsung have to offer.
I myself am purchasing a 65 inch LG OLED television with 4K resolution. It is the best television display my eyes have ever seen.
As far as longevity goes, those Korean OLED handsets are lasting long enough and well past my upgrade intervals and I usually go at least 2 years between upgrades.
JDI and Sharp are no longer competitive. Now if Apple would dump the inferior Sony camera for a Samsung or LG built one, the phone would have superior technology in all aspects.
I've seen the difference in the Apple vs. Samsung displays along with the difference in picture quality. The Samsung handset is better and the difference isn't slight.
If it weren't for the fact that the other handsets use the spyware OS known as Android, I would already have switched.
Taking excellent photos to go along with a great display is worth it to many people. And why Samsung is at the top of Android hardware although LG also makes some very nice phones also.
They are both good screen;however, every OLED screen older than 3 months at bestbuy has screen ghosting/burn-in, even with the screen demos that constantly change. The Apple devices do not show this when I check them. Just my experience and I check everytime I go to Bestbuy which is usually every 4 weeks. Never fails. That said, I hope these ghosting issues are improved on by 2017 releases and the iPhone has OLED.
The two are very comparable in specs and vintage - particularly in display size, battery capacity and processor.
You are a big fan of the bestbuy demo phones and burn-in. I still use my Wave daily and no burn in after 6 years. Samsung have sold many hundreds of millions OLED screened phones and the negative reports on the screens are statistically minuscule, amounting to a few anecdotal gripes about phones that have been abused in some way. I am sure my phone might have screen burn-in if I left it on with a static image being displayed for months, but since I haven't, the screen is still fine after 6 years.
The big difference in time is standby time. This is an indication of the efficiency of the processor/RAM (it looks like the iPhone had 122MB more?)/ROM, and mostly the OS (also what the OS is doing in the background). Overall, these times are a very poor way to judge an OLED over an LCD. That said, long term, OLED is where the iPhone will need to go. Again, I am all for OLED but it has some problem areas, like all new technology. I just don't see how you can compare these two phones and say this proves OLED is better? Could at least use screen ON times.
Also, the demos don't allow for static screens, at least the ones I see. I will need to look at some real world S4s sometime.
As I said before - the number of OLED screened phones now in circulation is vast. Where are all the complaints - as in 10s of thousands of them, given there must be well over a hundred million OLED screened phones by now?
Try a Google search - iphone display problem. 41,400,000 results - oops, better not buy an iPhone then. (Yes, I am being deliberately facetious.)
I'll bet when Apple release the new iOS with the AMOLED screen phones, they will include a screen saver, for those users who might otherwise be inclined to accidentally leave a static image displaying for months.
https://www.att.com/shop/wireless/apple-iphone-buy-one-get-one-free.html
Still a pretty big difference in these phones, tough to compare screens. Especially when both have gotten significantly better and more efficient in nearly 6 years.