Where Will Apple Get Flash Memory Now? 245
An anonymous reader writes "EE Times examines whether Samsung could be about to control the equipment output of Apple by putting the Cupertino company on a rationed supply of NAND flash as the non-volatile memory goes into short supply in 2013. The analysis argues that Apple may need to put down billions of dollars of cash to fund a guaranteed NAND flash supply plan, something that Samsung did in the middle of the last decade."
At the prices Apple charges for extra memory (Score:5, Funny)
they could probably pay someone to assemble the bits by hand under an electron microscope.
this is why Apple has a huge cash stash (Score:3)
need a fab? buy a fab. update it. make a screaming pile of flash memory. undercut the market price while supplying all their own.
oh, and One More Thing... we remember who our friends are, and they get a discount.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Unfortunately a fab is not a household appliance that you can have installed by next Tuesday. These things take time to plan and build and need to operate for a while before they crank out working chips. If Apple needs flash memory next year, this year is a little late to start planning.
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oh, and One More Thing... we remember who our friends are, and they get a discount.
2% discount, provided you buy it on valentines day, and you don't mind that it's already engraved with "Happy Birthday Julilly-Lynn"
Re:this is why Apple has a huge cash stash (Score:5, Funny)
If you have Apple's pile of cash, getting a fab is pretty damn easy. You just hire people who know exactly what they are doing. If you scramble, you can have blueprints and permits done in a month, all the POs and contracts can be signed by next month, and you can break the ground and go ahead. All it takes is focused people who know exactly what it takes in their discipline -- architects, process engineers, building site managers, etc.
Funniest post ever! (Score:5, Insightful)
That may be one of the funniest things I've read in a while.
Next time I need a baby in two weeks, I'm going to get together a team of 18 women and have them knock it out. I can pay extra, so it shouldn't be problem to get them focused and working together.
"the typical man-hour myth" (Score:2)
it's not how many resources you can put into a task, it's getting the RIGHT resources...
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:"the typical man-hour myth" (Score:4, Informative)
I wager that no matter what resources I muster, getting a functioning baby, from scratch (so to speak), is going to take me no less than 36 weeks, and that's shorting the process by a couple figuring you can induce early (i.e.: the base moulding won't be applied and some of the paint won't be finished).
I've watched some "fast track" architectural projects (I'm a structural engineer in real life), and one of two things happen: The project ends up taking just as long as it would have, or it becomes an absolute clusterfuck where nothing works properly. Occasionally, you get both the regular schedule AND the clusterfuck. On very rare occasions, and on very small projects, good planning actually saves time - but it's still never as much as the owner would like.
Re: (Score:2)
I find your baby needs disturbing.
Re:Funniest post ever! (Score:5, Funny)
That project might not succeed, but if they're getting 18 women pregnant I suspect there are a lot of happy developers anyway.
the old AMD plants are closed or underutilized (Score:2)
and with enough crackling, fresh, green US of America freakin' M.O.N.E.Y, obstacles melt quickly.
Re:the old AMD plants are closed or underutilized (Score:5, Insightful)
It took SAMSUNG 2 years to build a fab in China recently. That was considered neck-breaking speed to have one built. China is the easiest place to build b/c of poor labor and environmental laws, but you can't simply clear land, pour concrete, complete a building, and get the equipment online much faster. Even if you purchased an old fab, it would take at least a year or two b/c the old equipment wouldn't be of the quality necessary -- nor would the air filtration, etc. It'd take you almost as long to re-furb an old fab as it would to build a new one to get it to where you'd want it to be.
All companies that build fabs have the kind of money to make these things happen. Pouring more into it won't make it happen any faster as speed is always a priority in the industry. You build a fab, expect to get so many years out of it of high profit, then switch gears to low profit as you build another fab for the higher profit things... and then re-tool the old fab or sell it when the cycle starts over.
Gah, Slashdot needs a better way to log in so I don't have to post as AC w/ out wiping what I just wrote and finding the post to reply to... oh well.
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I guess you have never dealt with development permits, public consultation, building permits, environmental impact studies, inspections, utility hookups, etc. To break ground within a year of starting is considered very fast in development circles. Then there is build out, hiring, equipment installation and worker training together which will add about a year. So at lest two years from project start to opening.
Re:this is why Apple has a huge cash stash (Score:5, Informative)
If you have Apple's pile of cash, getting a fab is pretty damn easy. You just hire people who know exactly what they are doing. If you scramble, you can have blueprints and permits done in a month, all the POs and contracts can be signed by next month, and you can break the ground and go ahead. All it takes is focused people who know exactly what it takes in their discipline -- architects, process engineers, building site managers, etc.
Seriously?? LOL...
I used to work for a company that builds the robots/machines required for fabs. It would take 6 to 12 months just to spin up extra capacity in an existing fab. Most fabs took at least 2 years to build, from planning to production. In addition, it then takes another year or so to improve chip yields to get the plant at maximum efficiency. And this is working with major chip manufacturers with experienced personnel already on their payroll and with huge budgets. For Apple to build a fab, it would take them much longer as they would be literally starting from scratch with hiring fab managers, etc.
Non story (Score:2, Insightful)
Apple may need to put down billions of dollars of cash to fund a guaranteed NAND flash supply plan
..which wouldn't be a problem for them.. and given the way they've worked with processors and displays, is to be expected.
Re: Non story (Score:5, Insightful)
Well the story assumes that Apple hasn't already secured their supply. This story from 2005 [macworld.com] reports how Apple made 5-year deals with 5 different manufacturers to secure their supply. The deals have since run out but it doesn't take a grand strategist to guess that Apple may have negotiated new deals. Remember Apple is very secretive so that may not announced to the world all their plans. Also, Apple has been known to front money to their suppliers in exchange for guaranteed supplies. Today they are sitting on billions in cash.
I doubt such a deal could remain secret due to SEC filings from Apple. Not to mention the fact that the suppliers will want to say "Look at us! We just got a billion dollars!" so that they may boost their stock prices. If we haven't heard about Apple making such a deal, then it probably hasn't happened. And it may not happen easily. Everyone is using flash storage now, and there is likely to be a lot of concern over supply. The big players may not want to make a deal with Apple to guarantee a supply so that they do not artificially limit the supply for their own products. Of course with a few extra billion, you could possibly increase your production significantly.
Re: Non story (Score:2)
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They do. They're spending a LOT more capital in the last couple of years.
http://www.asymco.com/2012/12/11/the-new-age-of-capital-intensity/ [asymco.com]
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Their latest 10-Q filing shows $6.6bn in "other current assets", and $5.1bn in "other assets". Prepayments to suppliers will be included in there - "other current assets" if it is in respect of components to be supplied within the next year, or "other assets" if the components are to be supplied after more than one year.
Big capital costs = up front money (Score:2)
Apple pre-paid which means they would have to account for it to their stockholders and the SEC. If they made an agreement on price and supply amount without negotiating upfront money, I don't think that they have to report it.
If they have a contractual obligation that would have to appear in the financial statements whether or not there is money exchanged up front. It is a liability of the company and they would be obligated to report it. It's kind of an irrelevant point however since no supplier is going to accept orders that size without a lot of upfront money. To produce the quantity of product Apple would buy requires major capital investment (equipment, facilities, etc) and no one is going to invest that sort of coin tru
Re: Big capital costs = up front money (Score:3)
Re: Non story (Score:5, Informative)
Well the story assumes that Apple hasn't already secured their supply. This story from 2005 [macworld.com] reports how Apple made 5-year deals with 5 different manufacturers to secure their supply. The deals have since run out but it doesn't take a grand strategist to guess that Apple may have negotiated new deals. Remember Apple is very secretive so that may not announced to the world all their plans. Also, Apple has been known to front money to their suppliers in exchange for guaranteed supplies. Today they are sitting on billions in cash.
Please rtf the original article. The deal with 5 different manufacturers is why Apple will find it difficult to source the supply in 2013. They schemed the manufacturers and always projected they needed way more than they purchased. This lead to oversupply in the market and lower prices. So the 5 year, 5 manufacturer deal fell off the cliff. Therefore Apple in 2013 will have to put up billions as opposed to 1.25 billion and they probably have to buy all of the nand they think they need. Not just project and then play one manufacturer against another. Therefore Apple will possibly pre-pay and possibly pre-pay much higher prices and will also need to buy it. They will probably not make as much money on the NAND but still a significant margin.
And the parent post is modded informative! The best of slashdot. This post needs to be modded down into negative territory.
Re: Non story (Score:5, Informative)
Back in 2005 Apple pre-paid $1.25 billion to five NAND flash memory suppliers to ensure they would be able to supply Apple with memory through 2010. That was a five-year supply agreement (see Apple to pre-pay $1.25 billion for flash memory) that made sure Apple could continue its apparently inexorable rise as a mobile consumer electronics supplier. The five NAND flash memory suppliers were the same as those listed above although how the pre-payment broke down was not revealed at the time.
Apple also then proceeded to give its suppliers an indication of its estimated future needs year-by-year so that the vendors could tailor their manufacturing to meet its needs. The only problem was that towards the end of the five-year agreement Apple was reportedly accused of always over-estimating the need causing the flash memory vendors to be always in an oversupply situation and unable to raise prices. These accusations circulated in South Korea during 2009 (see Apple accused of NAND price manipulation).
Re: Non story (Score:5, Informative)
This only become a better situation for memory manufacturers with iPhone and iPod with demand for 16 and 32 GB memory sizes. Who else was buying at that size? Even the Zune never got more solid state storage than 16GB. And look a the iPad, now pushing 128 GB, while the WIndows Surface RT was released with 16GB and 32GB. The point is that if the manufacturers wanted to sell memory, Apple was the firm that was mass marketing large quantities to consumers.
What really changed in 2010 was Android, and the smartphone market share approaching 10%. It is interesting to note at that time RIM still had the largest market share, and would grow in revenue for another year. It is also interesting that most phones only has 1GB or none at all. Android phones, OTOH, like iPhone, built a demand of lots of memory. The smartphone was going to grow, and it was going to require lots of nand flash. Apple, for the first time had real competition for memory.
Here is where the manufacturers have to be careful. While tablets are going to drive memory demand, phones may not. I bought the 64(57available)GB iPhone and now realize that there is no way I am going to use all of it. With permanent cloud storage for purchased content and streaming I do not need it. An android phone I bought last year had almost no storage. It does not need it. All content is streamed. So right now we are in a bubble. People still want memory, but how long are they going to pay for memory they do not need? And if other do what MS is doing, which is selling tablet with insufficient memory, how is that going to effect the market?
Comment removed (Score:4)
Re: Non story (Score:5, Interesting)
If flash gets tight, Adnroid tablet makers don't have many qualms about reducing internal flash and externalizing storage costs via (micro-)SD cards. As it is, a lot of those tablets might already be using lower capacity/spec flash that Apple wouldn't touch if it was free...
Re: Non story (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason Apple's iPhone/iPad sales were up last quarter but their profit remained flat is because they were losing more money on the supply chain.
So I wouldn't assume it wont hurt them, it already did on other components (screens), it likely will on flash too. It may well mean that not only will profits be flat again with an increase in sales, but might actually decline despite shifting more units.
Effectively much of Apple's profits have been gained because they had great deals on components, they don't have those deals any more, and their suppliers like Samsung are sick of their lawsuit antics and in close competition now so are unlikely to sign such sweet deals again either. You're right that they could raise prices but that will have an impact on sales - maybe not to fans, but certainly to the average Joe who also buys the iPhone normally.
Effectively they're in a quandary, because costs of production has gone up as fast as rate of sales causing flat profits, if they raise prices then they'll lose even the continued increase in rate of sales, if they don't, then profit might actually go down. The only way they can deal with it is to make more profit elsewhere (i.e. a new product line), or somehow more drastically increase rate of iThing sales to outpace the growth in component cost.
In reality they'll probably attempt both, the success of which will no doubt play out in front of our eyes in the next year dependent on whether the iWatch and iTV turn up, or the iPhone 6 and iPad 5 can steal a serious share of the market back off of Android. They certainly can't rely on cheap component deals though - I suspect even Foxconn will be reaching a point where it realises it's got Apple by the balls in terms of manufacture given that perhaps no one else can churn out the levels Apple needs to meet demand and may start upping it's prices somewhat too.
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Well, being bitten is something else that they planned for--by having an enormous mountain of cash. Part of the brilliance of how Apple operates is not just that they plan for the stuff that they can control, they've also been planning for wild contingencies like this. Being able to buy your way out of any situation (at least once or twice) is terribly valuable.
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Well, being bitten is something else that they planned for--by having an enormous mountain of cash.
Yes and no. On the surface you are correct Apple has so much money not matter what problem they face they can probably write a check to make the immediate issue go away. They have such great contribution margin on many of their products they many even still be profitable writing that big check.
Trouble is as always Wall Street. The institutional share holders don't like that Apple has left them out of the profits; no dividend payments. Right now a goodly chunk of Apple's market cap is directly supporte
So much FUD (Score:4, Insightful)
Every time a company is not 100% vertically integrated you get these kind of fearmongering articles. NAND flash is a commodity, they can find it somewhere else.
Re:So much FUD (Score:4, Interesting)
Every time a company is not 100% vertically integrated you get these kind of fearmongering articles. NAND flash is a commodity, they can find it somewhere else.
But not necessarily at a price that makes people happy.
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People would be a lot more unhappy than Apple though. Think of who uses flash memory. And then think of what happens if Apple were to pay a premium to lock in supply.
Basically if Samsung puts Apple on a
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Shit NAND flash is a commodity, but when you build high end devices that demand both performance and low power consumption your choices are quite limited.
It will be interesting to see what Apple do. They usually try to second source everything, but often one of the options seems to suck (LG retina displays, for example).
Re:I hate the term FUD (Score:5, Informative)
No, its not probably the start of the term; it goes back, in that specific form, at least to IBM's tactics against competitors in the 1970s.
What Would Steve Do? (Score:5, Funny)
Of course, if anyone else tried this, the new tech would be non-viable, but Steve would use his force of will to make the new tech work at the price he wanted to pay.
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If Steve Jobs were still alive, he'd just find the next big thing, and stop using NAND flash. Memristors anyone?
In Soviet Union, comradstors would keep Steve fleshy and alive!
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Seriously?...
The fact that I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not...ouch.
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so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:5, Insightful)
this is not a school yard
samsung borrowed lots of money to build high tech flash memory factories. they can play hardball with apple, but they need to have a customer lined up to buy up whatever apple doesn't. unused capacity means lost revenue while salaries and interest on the debt still has to be paid
Re:so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:5, Interesting)
This.
The article is completely crap. Samsung will sell flash to anyone who will buy it, until they are out of capacity. Sure they will likely give better deals, faster delivery, whatever to their own mobile and computer divisions, but they are in the business of selling these chips. They are not out of spite going to ignore a huge customer.
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Short of buying someone with a fab, Apple cannot just buy a fab. They need the knowhow as much as the physical plant. What will happen is they will buy rights to the output of a fab for X years for Y dollars. They could also buy a small Fab firm, but there are not that many of those left. Who short of Intel and Samsung is down to 22nm? And we both know Apple is not buying Intel or Samsung.
Re:so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:4, Interesting)
How about Sandisk?
They're a 6 Billion dollar a year company in terms of revenue (about a quarter of Samsung), and with a market cap of 14 Billion they're quite purchasable.
The company has a shiny outlook thanks to the increase in flash prices this year [seekingalpha.com], so I would think that a takeover bid would be graciously accepted right now.
They have their own NAND fabs, have a growing SSD business (vertical integration with desktops?). The only stick point I can see is the Sansa music players, which might get buried during the buyout.
Re:so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:4, Insightful)
Sandisk are not really a viable competitor to Samsung for very high end devices though. Samsung have a big advantage in terms of performance and low power consumption, and are very competitive on price. That's why Sandisk flash mostly ends up in SD memory cards, mid-range devices and devices where power consumption isn't an issue.
Hynix do some okay stuff. Building/buying a fab is an option but I doubt Apple would want to go down that road because the cost of R&D and investment just to keep up with the state of the art is immense, and Apple doesn't do any manufacturing anyway.
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Apple can afford to pay people with the knowhow. If they wanted and needed a fab, they could get one.
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Apple is not buying Intel
That is an interesting proposition actually. Apple has a market cap almost four times Intel's, and close to it just in assets. Apple probably could pull off a hostile take over of Intel if they were really determined.
That would radically alter the market.
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I doubt it would be allowed by regulators.
It would be bad for the entire industry to have the nearly monopoly CPU vendor for the server/desktop space so closely linked with an OS vendor.
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Re:so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:4, Insightful)
The summary is way over-dramatic.
The customer they have lined up to buy the NAND flash is Samsung itself, as they're now making a shit-load of smartphones, tablets, TVs and whatnot. There just may not be enough flash memory to go around.
The article is also littered with phrases like "what effect, if any..", "one can imagine that...", "there is the possibility that..."
Re:so who is samsung going to sell to? (Score:4, Insightful)
This other confidence inspiring gem FTA stuck out:
"There are few reliable sources for this, a comment in the Korea Times here, an unnamed supply chain sources there, but the general opinion is that..."
So what... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:So what... (Score:5, Insightful)
A fab isn't just some generic piece of equipment, and getting beyond 32nm has proven difficult for most companies. If it were so easy, then AMD would have 22nm processors currently and wouldn't be having nearly as many problems competing in the CPU space. There is also expertise that is required beyond the basic equipment.
Re: (Score:3)
Not only the expertise, but also the time required to get up and running, but also the time.
Once you decide to set up your own chip fabrication plant it will be a few years (maybe a few more) before you start producing the chips.
By that time the entire market can change. Setting up your own fab is not a solution to a problem you see coming in 2013 or even probably 2015.
Re: (Score:3)
The usual way... (Score:2, Funny)
...they invent flash and sue everyone who uses their patent.
FUD (Score:2)
We are all frustrated by Apple at one time or another, but that don't justify spreading ridiculous FUD.
Apple has more cash then ANYONE IN HISTORY; security their supply lines is hardly going to be difficult.
Apple has...lots of Cash? (Score:2)
Apple has more cash...
Let me stop you there. Having lots of cash on hand is a poor sign for a company. The fact that this article is about shrinking margins...on the heals of Apples shrinking sales, and Apple are looking little prepared for it. Technology companies burn through money on the way down. They could still invest the money...but that takes time to realise.
american companies have quit looking long term (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, it's more that the executives in publicly traded companies have to report quarterly results. If they aren't good the heat comes.
Look at Ron Johnson.
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What is needed is for an EMPLOYEE STOCK. One that is tied to profits, and is not allowed to be sold on the open markets. Yes, basically, an ESOP. However, they need to make it so that NO employee is allowed to own any public stock in the industry.
What you are describing is a mutual business or workers co-operative; where all employees own a portion of the business, are entitled to vote at AGMs and share in the profit, but the share of ownership is non-transferable- it lasts exactly as long as you are an employee. Additional capital can be raised on the open market as publicly tradeable bonds (such as PIBS), which more or less function as non-voting shares.
This is a sentiment I whole heartedly agree with. Mutual businesses have shown themselves to be
Re: (Score:2)
Wow... Talk about pulling a story out of thin air (Score:5, Insightful)
The article starts by saying there's little to no reliable evidence for this... but Apple MAY be planning to jump ship on Samsung with regards to manufacturing of its A7 processor. Then, from there it goes on to "if this happens, how will it affect Samsung's willingness to sell memory to Apple", and speculates (with zero support, not even rumors) that maybe Samsung MIGHT need to keep more of its own memory for its own products, in which case it MIGHT have to allocate how much memory Apple can buy (again, this is not even supported by some whisper the author heard in a bar - he's flying solo).
That's bad rumor-mongering even by analyst standards.
Re:Wow... Talk about pulling a story out of thin a (Score:4, Informative)
...all in the midst of a glut in capacity in the semiconductor industry.
Because. Offshoring. (Score:2)
This is the thing I hate -- and it's not just Apple. These US companies offshored Allllll their manufacturing and processes to take full advantage of cheap labor, third-world economies and loose environmental restrictions. People at home get laid off[0] jobs dried up, manufacturers closed their doors, and a good portion of blue collar labor went on unemployment. Now, these same assholes complain their is no "skilled labor" to fill their job openings, so they need to import H1B workers[1]. What's more, t
The "skilled labor" problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Is less about outsourcing and more about pay rates and employer expectations.
http://www.startribune.com/business/164935926.html?refer=y [startribune.com]
There was another story in this paper as well about this I couldn't find the link to -- a survey found that the "problem" wasn't a lack of workers, it was the low wages and working conditions that kept employers from recruiting workers.
Training is an issue as well -- employers have a desire to hire "ready for work" employers, even though the employees they often want need to have extensive education and experience with complex, high tech manufacturing systems that are difficult to get experience with...without working on one.
It's a self-perpetuating problem for employers. As long as they refuse to invest in training and paying salaries, they will have a shortage of workers.
I also think they have another problem -- the culture of manufacturing and blue collar employment generally. Manufacturing jobs have historically been "dumb" jobs -- the kind of work some high school dropout or grad got working on an assembly line turning a bolt, adding a part or whatever. Little to no skill, no education. Treat them awful and throw them away, we can always plug another body into this. It's why much of this COULD be outsourced -- there's little difference between an ex-jock who barely got a high school diploma and some third world country mouse who moved to the city.
Unions boosted the wages of these jobs until the early 70s, but there was always this cultural gulf between "labor" and "management"" and usually open hostility, as management sought to screw labor any way they could, and labor sought to take management for maximum compensation and minimum work. Labor were people to be piss-tested, searched and yelled at, and sic your security goons on if they step out of line.
Now we're at this point where the people manufacturers need aren't the dumb HS grads or third world peons, they are educated people with extensive skills, but business keep perpetuating this fucked up class warfare kind of culture, with the working conditions and pay to go with it. No wonder they can't find people -- anyone self-aware enough and smart enough to do this kind of work wants nothing to do with being treated as little more than a slave.
If we would have a manufacturing environment that treated the skilled workers more like white collar office workers and paid them that way, I can only imagine the talent pool would grow a lot deeper and the productivity would skyrocket.
Apple may need to put down billions of dollars (Score:3)
Yeah, that'll be a real disaster, what with Apple being so short of cash and all.
Cash rich with shrinking margins (Score:2)
Yeah, that'll be a real disaster, what with Apple being so short of cash and all.
Except right now 35% of Apples value got chopped of Apples Value due to slightly less than expected sales and shrinking margins, Judging by Foxconn cutting iProduct manufacture, and this news I guess we get to see a repeat of Apples share drop...and with it an awful lot of brand support.
Apple can spend their "locked up" foreign money (Score:2)
I don't understand why Apple doesn't just spend all their $billions locked up overseas to build an overseas manufacturing facility. They have plenty. Probably plenty to do it multiple times. Then, they get the best of multiple worlds: 1) they are not as reliant on Samsung, 2) they get to use that money tax-free, 3) they can have some meaningful diversification
And if the thing goes belly-up? Then they "buy" the whole thing from their foreign subsidiary with US cash and get a tax rebate on the business e
To Apple billions of $$ is no big deal (Score:2)
What does Apple care? Apple has that much spare change under the couch cushions.
Cash on Hand (Score:2)
What does Apple care? Apple has that much spare change under the couch cushions.
...because if this article is right the company Apple has lawsuits with in >50 countries worldwide, in an attempt to get them banned, suddenly finds itself dependant on a critical component. Paying more cash is only part of the problem, but your right in the fact that is the least of its worries, not being able to fulfil demand is a greater problem.
There are many alternatives. (Score:3)
Taiwan? Germany? Or, godforbid, the United States?
The added bonus is that they wont copy your designs while they're making this stuff for you.
Oh noes!!! (Score:2)
Because everyone knows Apple isn't sitting on mountains of cash or anything like that.
This is sill (Score:2)
This is silly. Intel's entire sales: CPUs, motherboards, memory... were $53b last year. Apple has $140b sitting in the bank. They could buy 100% of Intel's capacity with cash on hand for almost 3 years. Apple's problems with Samsung I'm sure are an annoyance, they aren't a critical threat to the company.
And before someone mentions some sort of secret Intel conspiracy they could buy all of Intel for less than their cash on hand
they bought Anobit but.... (Score:3, Informative)
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Apple could probably put a small percentage of their capital into TSMC and double or triple their capacity.
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They would have decided two years ago.
Maybe there's a reason Apple's capital spending has increased dramatically in the last 2-3 years.
http://www.asymco.com/2012/12/11/the-new-age-of-capital-intensity/ [asymco.com]
Re:Anobit? (Score:5, Informative)
Because Wikipedia: "Anobit Technologies, Ltd. is an Israeli fabless designer of flash memory controllers." For the reading impaired, this means that they design memory controllers, not memory chips, and they only design them, they don't make them.
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I'm sorry, could you repeat that? I suffer from reading impairment.
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Didn't Apple buy Anobit? So why would they buy NAND from Samsung?
Do Anobit make actual flash memory or just flash controllers? I can't seem to find the information on Google
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Niether. They design flash controllers, but don't have a fab.
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Nothing like the nerdrage geeks seem to have against companies they have nothing do with. Grind your teeth!
Disclaimer: I hate the fact that people get so riled up over cell phones
Re:Yes please (Score:5, Funny)
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Yes, would've been much better to still be in these mythical days when everything about smartphones was cheap, open, easy to use, and not at all locked down and preconfigured with abortionware by the cell carriers.
You lot amuse me - the iPhone is orders of magnitude more "open" and functional than anything that existed in anything remotely resembling a "mainstream" smartphone market prior to the iPhone's debut. But because it's not completely open in every way you can imagine, you clickety-clack away on Sl
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Reading fail. Go to just before the first iPhone debuted and look at what you had with regards to app development and platform compatibility for phones. LOL. Everything was proprietary, we'll-let-you-sign-an-NDA-if-you-buy-our-reps-a-couple-nights-on-the-town, and so on. Even the fucking power connectors and power specs for the phones weren't standard. At least Apple was making stuff with the same connector for almost a decade.
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Which is entirely tangential to the point he was making. Since he made an argument and not merely an assertion, there's no reason to look at his grammar or anything else other than the actual logic used no?
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It's for you to decide by examining the argument itself isn't it?
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And ditto you with the AC...
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long term sustainability is not profitable.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yup, so retarded .. I mean any fool can be one of the top companies in terms of revenue, market capitalization, and profitability?
I'm sure you could make such a company too if you wanted.
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My theory is to avoid paying royalties to Microsoft for implementing the FAT32 format, which would be pretty much necessary as people would expect to be able to shove the SD card into their Windows system and access files.
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samsung is the largest manufacturer of flash
apple's problem now isn't design, its sourcing enough materials to be able to make enough products to fulfill demand. look at HTC. they designed a decent phone but can't seem to manufacture it to actually sell it in the store to people
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Samsung has a monopoly on NAND flash chips?
Not a monopoly, but a clear majority of world wide manufacturing.
Re: Stupid Move (Score:2)
Re:Stupid Move (Score:5, Insightful)
6 years ago Samsung was barely a competitor in the non-smartphone market, now Samsung is outselling Apple in smartphones.
Samsung is probably their own biggest customers for their NAND flash. Companies often "buy" within their own divisions, so Samsung's phone division is Samsung's component division's best customer.
Now also consider that Samsung has become the largest manufacture for smart TV's and AV components, all requiring NAND flash, even some of their refrigerators have web services built into them. Samsung is creating an empire significantly larger than Apple.
ANY Samsung shareholder should be thrilled with the direction Samsung has taken and turning it into a household name that exceeds Apple's mindshare around the world.
You could be a stupid investor and dump Samsung shares because you don't like how they are treating Apple, but realize Apple is becoming a small drop in Samsung's profits and business strategy. Considering how vocal Apple has been about moving away from Samsung, Samsung is taking the right steps to sever ties and move towards more lucrative and profitable industries, namely, themselves.
Samsung makes phones, tablets, computers, the parts that goes into those devices AND TV's, appliances, and so much more. Samsung is so friggen diversified that Apple probably NEVER made a significant impact on their profits, so if I ran Samsung, I would say good riddance and cripple one of their pissy competitors in only one of their many many divisions.
Lets put your convo in perspective (Score:3)
Apple much to its disgrace has large amounts of unused cash around, that perhaps it should have invested earlier, but buying out Samsung is simply not even close to being a reality, Samsungs market cap sits at $200Billion admittedly half that of Apples Plummeting Market cap of $400Billion, but it is far too large for Apple to buy.
They should perhaps invest in manufacturing. (Score:2)
Time for an iFab. Apple can easily foot the bill for a new fab anywhere they want. Hopefully in the USA.
The fact its an entirely different business from manufacturing they rebadging foxconn phones, its what up until recently so profitable [not so much anymore...ask foxconn] where Apple make 40% and Faoxconn make about 3%, setting up facilities even if they manage to move that much money around, takes time and planning, and whatever they so they will shit on the USA.