After rumors had surfaced in the meantime that Apple might do without a successor to the third generation of the iPhone SE, which was released in 2022, the signs are now increasing again in the opposite direction. The (comparatively) budget iPhone is now in the works and will come onto the market over the next year and, among other things, will be the first SE model to use an OLED panel. Which supplier this display will be manufactured by is still being negotiated.
This is reported by the Korean portal The Elec, citing “industry sources”. As a result, Samsung Display and the Chinese supplier BOE are dueling with offers for display production for the iPhone SE 4. Samsung Display is said to have made an offer of 30 US dollars per panel, while BOE made an offer of 35 US dollars. According to the Elec report, Apple itself wants to push both prices even further, so there is still disagreement on this aspect.
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In principle, Samsung Display and BOE are likely to share responsibility for OLED production, although not to the same extent. At BOE in particular, Apple could raise legitimate doubts about the extent to which the company is commissioned to produce the displays, and not just with regard to pricing.
During the course of iPhone 13 production, the Chinese supplier is said to have made changes to the display of the iPhone 13 without discussing these with the client – which, according to The Elec, in turn led to over 70 percent of the iPhone 14’s screens being replaced Samsung displays were produced. Tienma, another supplier from China, is only given outsider chances because they have set the highest price per panel at $40.