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Samsung Terminates LCD Contract With Apple
An anonymous reader writes "Samsung has decided to terminate an ongoing contract with Apple to supply LCD panels for use in its growing range of devices. That means, come next year, there will be no Samsung panels used across the iPad, iPod, iPhone, and Mac range of devices. The reason seems to be two-fold. On the one hand, Apple has been working hard to secure supplies from other manufacturers and therefore decrease its reliance on Samsung. On the other, Apple is well-known for demanding and pushing lower pricing, meaning it just doesn't make business sense anymore for Samsung to keep supplying Apple with displays."
This clearly seems to be the result of patent disputes...
With the ongoing legal action between Samsung and Apple it’s no surprise that the relationship has cooled.
Apple and Samsung have repeatably been suing each other in court, so it probably doesn't make much business sense for Samsung to continue providing Apple with components.
Curious this wasn't mentioned in the article.
love is just extroverted narcissism
retaliation, anyone?
This could not possibly have anything to do with Apple's recent legal activities, eh?
" On the other, Apple is well-known for demanding and pushing lower pricing" Same tactic Wal-Mart used to close most American manufacturing..
Why doesn't Apple push its pricing lower, is suppliers are reducing their cost?
Here's a link you can use:
http://www.alibaba.com/showroom/crt-monitor-manufacturers.html
Have gnu, will travel.
Uhm, Apple has been rapidly reducing their orders to Samsung. Samsung admits as much in the article.
In other words, this is a (lame) face-saving PR stunt by Samsung. "WE'RE CUTTING OFF APPLE'S SUPPLY OF DISPLAY PANELS (uhm, as soon as Apple stops ordering from us)."
On the one hand, Apple has been working hard to secure supplies from other manufacturers and therefore decrease its reliance on Samsung. On the other, Apple is well-known for demanding and pushing lower pricing, meaning it just doesn't make business sense anymore for Samsung to keep supplying Apple with displays."
On my third hand, Apple and Samsung have been suing the piss out of one another, and that is beginning to strain other business relationships.
It would appear they've been tapering off their shipments of displays for while. This really should not shock anyone, aside from the fact that everyone knows Samsung hates Apple, companies move to where the components are priced where they want them to be all the time. Nothing to see here, move along.
Its personal, not business.
Demand from Apple went from 15 million to 1,5 million panels and they are in the process of eliminating Samsung as a supplier completely. They have invested in Toshiba plants for a reason. There is also an indication that the reason that Foxconn have invested in Sharp had something to do with Apple. Although I'm more convinced it has something to do with their IZGO panels then AppleTV.
That Samsung "terminated" the LCD contract has zero impact as Apple wanted to eliminate them from the process anyway and seeing how steadily demand dropped (1,5 million are peanuts if you take into account how many products have LCD panels) that process was already underway. The only thing here is that Samsung can save a little face.
So is this pure PR or even damage control. And it is understandable, if a big client like Apple announced it takes it business elsewhere as a company you gonna take a hit.
None of this has anything to do with patent disputes, Samsung tablets, Samsung smartphones, or anything else.
Because gullible American media people believe any lie they're fed by their Corporate Overlords.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Fortunately the Koreans are used to this.
But there's nothing new about this situation. Every manufacturer has the opportunity to employ smart people to improve the products it initially replicates en masse. Some are more predatory than others. I don't believe it's any surprise that Apple is at loggerheads with Samsung after Galaxy of legal allegations that have been tossed back and forth, worldwide between the 2.
If war is the result of diplomatic failure between states, then lawsuits are the result of a diplomatic failure between corporations.
Big Surprise?
I thought Apple was supply constrained. Perhaps Samsung was allocating the maximum they could for Android devices. Could it be every Apple LCD was a lost Android opportunity.
On the other, Apple is well-known for demanding and pushing lower pricing
Since when???
Samsung displays were actually the only non-defective displays that shipped with the new retina macbooks. Other screens have had huge ghosting issues (I went through 4 laptops before getting a Sammy screen that actual worked right) pretty much fresh off the lot.
It would be nice if this brought these ridiculous issues out into the light so Apple has to face the fact they completely screwed up the retina launch... of course, we all know that would never happen.
Fucking i-Tards.
"A learning experience is one of those things that says, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.'" - DNA
Samsung delivery drivers can't find where to drop off the monitors when they use the GPS on their iPhones
When you get a billion dollar judgement against you, not that I think that will stick on appeal, your bound to have some grievances with continuing to provide your product to the person who sued you.
I thought this was illegal. How can Samsung get away with supplying Apple with LSD all these years?
-Emily Litella
Took them long enough to tell Apple to sod off.. :-)
In other news, shares in Sharp Electronics and LG Electronics jumped sharply today, for unspecified reasons.
-- Always borrow money from a pessimist; they don't expect to be paid back.
Reason 3: Samsung didn't appreciate being sued by apple?
1: Apple and Samsung get involved in lawsuits.
2: Apple decides to reduce orders from Samsung and order from competitors.
3: Apple demands lower prices for components.
4: Samsung decides to reduce the supply available to Apple.
It sounds like all of those have been gradually happening to a greater and greater degree over time. I don't know which particular item happened first, but once the cycle started it just kept on escalating. The smaller the size of the order by Apple (either in terms of number of components or price per component) the less valuable the contract becomes, and the more Samsung is going to focus on finding alternatives to sell to. The smaller the number of units Samsung makes available to Apple and the less they're willing to budge on price, the more Apple is going to focus on finding alternatives to buy from. The less dependent each of them get on each other, the more the gloves come off in the courtroom. The more lawsuits that get filled, the less comfortable both of them are going to feel about depending on the other to sell/buy components to/from.
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
And the fact that Apple and Samsung have been at each others' throats in court for years has nothing to do with it.
To be honest, I'm surprised they still did any business with each other. Generally when one company gets the other's product banned from sale, it tends to put a strain on the relationship. But in the mobile market where everybody is suing everybody else, it's probably hard to keep track.
sueing the living shit out of your business partners doesn't seem to be a very fruitful negotiation tool for continued contracts!
If "retina display" is used as a scientific rather than marketing term then it shouldn't be copyrightable by Apple. Any display of equivalent angular density should be freely called a "retina display".
Most contracts have a penalty for early termination, any news on one?
http://qkme.me/3rget6
Yes, they steal ideas here and there and make a great product. Sure, they sue companies that steal their whole product. And yes, they make the best American consumer electronic products, ever.
Remember "smartphones" before the iPhone? It took years for any company to remotely match what the iPhone had when it LAUNCHED. To summarize, every slashdot thread about Apple: Haters going to hate.
Look soon for Samsung to be buying out Sharp's and LG' flat panel manufacturing so they can begin to build a stranglehold monopoly on all flat panel production.
That's what happens when you bite the hand that feeds you. Of course Apple will somehow spin this as a positive.
It seems the apprentice Steve Jobs learned a lot from Sith Lord Gates.
1: Apple and Samsung get involved in lawsuits.
2: Apple decides to reduce orders from Samsung and order from competitors.
3: Apple demands lower prices for components.
4: Samsung decides to reduce the supply available to Apple.
It sounds like all of those have been gradually happening to a greater and greater degree over time. I don't know which particular item happened first, but once the cycle started it just kept on escalating. The smaller the size of the order by Apple (either in terms of number of components or price per component) the less valuable the contract becomes, and the more Samsung is going to focus on finding alternatives to sell to. The smaller the number of units Samsung makes available to Apple and the less they're willing to budge on price, the more Apple is going to focus on finding alternatives to buy from. The less dependent each of them get on each other, the more the gloves come off in the courtroom. The more lawsuits that get filled, the less comfortable both of them are going to feel about depending on the other to sell/buy components to/from.
Or, Samsung realized that it could use its manufacturing capacity in making screens for Apple to make screens for its own product and those have a much higher profit margin than they got from Apple.
"You seem the sort to easily fall for bullshit marketing terms. Or are you seriously suggesting computer processors should be marketed as "fast", "super fast", "mega fast", "ultra fast", "super mega fast", "mega ultra fast", "super mega ultra fast", "super mega ultra faster", etc? I mean, that avoids meaningless numbers, and each step is fairly pointless for human comprehension of speed.
You've completely managed to avoid understanding any of Apple's very successful marketing. I mean, you missed the boat ENTIRELY. Talking about relative processor speeds is completely off the table. Mhz, GB, dpi - these things are absent from their marketing for a very good reason. Not even the geeks need it in the advertising. If they want it, they can look it up on the web site.
Apple's marketing is squarely focused on what you can accomplish with the device.
Is this an overextension of what had been the "value of branding" that is actually the corner stone of apple technology? Demanding a higher price for mid-level features but a slicker/pointsy-er/talked-about interface might be old news. Who is ready to short AAPL?
I expected this long ago. Only problem is that wouldnt Apple be samung's biggest customer of their displays, other than their own tablet division?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Samsung cares about the workers and their take home pay. They could not morally bring themselves to slash the pay needed to meet apple's draconian price demands, which would reduce them to even worse working conditions and abject poverty.
On the other hand, apple cares about the US consumers, and passes along the savings of the cheaper screens to the consumer.
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Russia-Orthodox-Christians-Apple-Logo-Blasphemous,18567.html
Like the parent to your post said, the Nexus 10:
"Google has also been working with Samsung to launch a 10-inch tablet, confirming leaks which suggested Google had teamed up with the Korean manufacturer for another device. Our source tells us that internally the tablet goes under the name “Codename Manta”, runs Google’s new Android 4.2 operating system (previously referred to as Key Lime Pie, but is set to retain the Jelly Bean branding), and will offer a 2560×1600 pixel (16:10) resolution, which we believe will offer around 300 pixels per inch (PPI) compared to the new iPad’s 264 PPI."
http://thenextweb.com/google/2012/10/21/revealed-everything-that-google-will-announce-at-its-android-event-on-october-29/
While Apple generally leans toward uniformity to increase product reliability, this probably has the effect of increasing reliance on single vendors like Samsung, sacrificing the ability to pit one against the other in the event that something they're doing to them is unfavorable.
That for example a tablet like the Galaxy Note 10.1 that has 2G RAM can do twice as much as the same tablet with 1G RAM, but now they have to talk specs because that's where the real improvements come. So they use the term "Retina Display" instead of talking actual resolution because actual resolution is a spec and "specs don't matter". Look next for Apple to come out with a 2G RAM tablet but they will call it 'Brain Memory'.
Because gullible American media people believe any lie they're fed by their Corporate Overlords.
No need to be a dick about it.
the post doesn't mention the third hand of apple's lawyer around samsung's neck
Probably for infringing on some patent or another. Apple is a company run by lawyers now.
Well, I could have gone on to describe the active trade war between China and Japan, China and Vietnam, China and the US, and the impact on Samsung of the passive China-SKorea and Japan-SKorea trade wars.
It's not just patents, there are literal riots involving tens or hundreds of thousands of people burning things in China, usually not reported in the US due to the Great Firewall, and the rise of both Rabid Nationalism and Protectionist Trade Wars in many countries is escalating.
Samsung is impacted by that, but the Apple-Samsung patent disputes are just part of what is going on, including supply chain aspects of component parts and licensing.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Apple has so many tens of billions of dollars in cash lying about that they actually don't know what to do with it all.
Apple make ~40% profit on a product that provides ~2/3 of their* revenue. Most companies can only dream of that situation.
So why do they need to push so hard for the lowest possible component price when they are making so much money?
Greed.
*Yes, I actually used the correct spelling. Deal with it.
Offtopic?
Not off-topic.
We'll find out soon whether Samsung was "losing money" on Apple or not. Going from 30 million displays a year to Apple to zero will be hard to fill the lost business on, before earnings time. (no matter how successful new product offerings are that come in to fill the void. )
My thought is that Samsung is pulling the "You're not breaking up with me! I'm breaking up with YOU!" thing.
Yeah the deal affects both parties stringly, but in different ways. Samsung loses a massive revenue stream ( you can bet flash memory and CPU's are not going to be renewed when they expire ) and Apple significantly limits their options to smaller companies with more risk, lower profit marigins and peril should a major failure occur in the supply chain.
It's a very interesting chess piece in all of this.
( Full disclosure.. I own apple stock and have an Android phone... go figure)
A Samsung spokesman refutes a report out of Korea that the electronics giant is ending its agreement to supply LCDs to Apple.
so who knows what is true...
There is a report that Samsung is denying that they're terminating the contract with Apple for LCDs:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57537773-37/samsung-says-its-still-supplying-lcd-panels-to-apple/
I have no idea what is true or not, but there are well known hazards believing rumors.
You obviously have drunk too much of that apple flavoured Kool-Aid. IBM to Motorola three designs {601,603,604}, five years later share cost in redesign for greater than 500Ghz {750}. Motorola with its 32-bit license of PowerPC would continues to make cpus, IBM the creator of POWER would go on to continue to define 64-bit POWER and 64-bit PowerPC.
However, a Samsung spokesman told CNET that the Korea Times post was 100 percent false.
"Samsung Display has never tried to cut the supply for LCD panels to Apple," the spokesman said.
He added that Samsung is asking the Korea Times to revise its story.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57537773-37/samsung-says-its-still-supplying-lcd-panels-to-apple/
...And here's the major flaw in allowing any old "Anonymous" to post articles at the same level as actual verified news. Samsung today denied the whole thing. Of course, I'm anonymous too. Do you believe everything you read?