Industry-wide chip shortages are affecting the production of Apple’s iPhone 13 models, says a new report by Bloomberg. Apple is expected to cut its 2021 iPhone 13 production by up to 10 million units because of the chip shortages.
Apple had been planning to produce 90 million iPhone 13 models in the final three months of the year, but Apple’s manufacturing partners have been informed that the production levels will be lower due to a lack of chip availability, as Broadcom and Texas Instruments are not able to deliver enough components.
iPhone 13 supplies have already been constrained, while expected further shortages during the holiday period will push delivery times even further out.
As seen in an iFixit teardown, the iPhone 13 uses a Broadcom AFEM-8215 front-end module, as well as a Broadcom BCM59365 wireless power receiver. Meanwhile, Texas Instruments makes the display power management IC, array driver, flash LED driver, and dual repeater for the iPhone 13 lineup.
Apple and the rest of the tech industry have been dealing with chip shortages for several months. Currently, the MacBook Pro, some iPhone models, the MacBook Air, iPad Pro, and other products are seeing longer than normal shipping times when ordered from the Apple Store.
In September comments, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said he expected that Apple would cut its MacBook shipments in half due to component shortages.
Chip shortages are expected to stretch well into 2022. While Apple is facing supply issues along with the rest of the industry, it has been one of the least affected companies so far in 2021.
