How Apple's Billion Dollar Sapphire Bet Will Pay Off

alphadogg writes: "Apple is making a billion dollar bet on sapphire as a strategic material for mobile devices such as the iPhone, iPad and perhaps an iWatch. Exactly what the company plans to do with the scratch-resistant crystal – and when – is still the subject of debate. Apple is creating its own supply chain devoted to producing and finishing synthetic sapphire crystal in unprecedented quantities. The new Mesa, Arizona plant, in a partnership with sapphire furnace maker GT Advanced Technologies, will make Apple one of the world's largest sapphire producers when it reaches full capacity, probably in late 2014. By doing so, Apple is assured of a very large amount of sapphire and insulates itself from the ups and downs of sapphire material pricing in the global market."

Comments

Well.

[Psyko]

The only thing it's hurting is the other people looking for sapphire display covers like was mentioned a couple months back.

Personally, I'm on the Gorilla Glass bandwagon.
It's:
          Stronger
          Stronger
          Cheaper & faster to produce

apple can pretty much do what it wants and they have plenty of money so it's not like it's a gamble at this point. $1bn is not going to dent their bank.

I own a couple of their devices, but I've personally relegated them down to be things I don't even carry around, and the interface always makes me feel like I'm using one of those kid's toy computers that has like 6 buttons with pictures on them (the cow says Mooooo).

Re:Well.

[catmistake]

The only thing it's hurting is the other people looking for sapphire display covers like was mentioned a couple months back.

Personally, I'm on the Gorilla Glass bandwagon. It's: Stronger Stronger Cheaper & faster to produce

apple can pretty much do what it wants and they have plenty of money so it's not like it's a gamble at this point. $1bn is not going to dent their bank.

I own a couple of their devices, but I've personally relegated them down to be things I don't even carry around, and the interface always makes me feel like I'm using one of those kid's toy computers that has like 6 buttons with pictures on them (the cow says Mooooo).

I to am on the Gorilla Glass bandwagon as well, and a big big fan of Corning. But Gorilla Glass is under patent. Synthetic Sapphire has been around since 1902, and it was cheap back then. Sapphire is hard... 9 on the Mohs scale, and the only substance harder is natural and synthetic diamond. I find it difficult to believe... so...do you have any references that says Gorilla Glass is cheaper and harder than Sapphire?

Re:Well.

[nitehawk214]

Should have been

          Stronger

          Lighter
Guess I'm tired.

Should have been
          Stronger
          Harder
          Faster

Re:Well.

[NoKaOi]

I find it difficult to believe... so...do you have any references that says Gorilla Glass is cheaper and harder than Sapphire?

Even Corning's own website doesn't say outright that Gorilla Glass is stronger. Only that:

Sapphire's performance as a cover for high-end watches probably leads to the current speculation. But those covers are much smaller than a mobile phone and are two to three times thicker than Gorilla Glass. In one of our commonly accepted strength tests, sapphire breaks more easily than Gorilla Glass after the same simulated use. Additionally, sapphire’s cost and environmental hit are huge issues.

Notice how they totally weasel around and, and only in "one of our commonly accepted strength tests" did Gorilla Glass outperform sapphire? So do they only have one test, or did sapphire outperform Gorilla Glass in all the others?

The real question is: Which is more likely to break in real life? That probably depends on how you test it. The best test would be to give a bunch of iPhones to a statistically significant set of teenagers and see how many screens of each are still intact after a while.

Also, there is some speculation on several different sites that Apple may not intend to use sapphire for the screen, but instead for the camera lens. They currently use it on the camera lens and the home button. I wonder if it's something they could use in other things that don't currently use Gorilla Glass, like macbook screens?

Re:Well.

[Seraphim1982]

Sapphire is hard... 9 on the Mohs scale, and the only substance harder is natural and synthetic diamond.

Lots of things are harder then Sapphire, particularly carbides and borides. Examples include silicon carbide, titanium carbide, boron (the hardest element) boron carbide, and boron nitride.

I find it difficult to believe... so...do you have any references that says Gorilla Glass is cheaper and harder than Sapphire?

No one ever said it was harder, they said it was stronger.

Re:Well.

[arth1]

I to am on the Gorilla Glass bandwagon as well, and a big big fan of Corning. But Gorilla Glass is under patent. Synthetic Sapphire has been around since 1902, and it was cheap back then. Sapphire is hard... 9 on the Mohs scale, and the only substance harder is natural and synthetic diamond. I find it difficult to believe... so...do you have any references that says Gorilla Glass is cheaper and harder than Sapphire?

I'm not the parent poster, but here's a ref claiming that Gorilla Glass is indeed both cheaper and far weaker than sapphire.

Re:Well.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sapphire is indeed harder than Gorilla Glass, whether you are talking about scratch hardness (the Mohs scale) or indentation hardness (the Vickers scale). There isn't an exact value for the scratch hardness of Gorilla Glass but it seems that people are easily able to scratch it with sandpaper, granite, or whatever, whereas you really cannot scratch sapphire with anything less than corundum/diamond.

Re:Well.

[R3d M3rcury]

silicon carbide, titanium carbide, boron (the hardest element) boron carbide, and boron nitride.

All of which would make a really crappy screen cover.

Re:Well.

[Guspaz]

From TFA, Gorilla Glass reportedly costs about $10 per display when Apple first started using it (on the original iPhone), with prices eventually dropping to about $3 today. Sapphire is expected to cost about $20 after all is said and done. It'll come down, certainly, but it's definitely not cheaper.

As for being tougher, my understanding is that it's far more scratch resistant than gorilla glass, but not necessarily as shatter resistant.

Re:Well.

[catmistake]

Also, there is some speculation on several different sites that Apple may not intend to use sapphire for the screen, but instead for the camera lens. They currently use it on the camera lens and the home button.

That (external) speculation sounds kind if silly... considering there are lots of other teeny tiny parts in iOS devices that the cost of which probably is more volitile and fluctuates more than the price of synthetic sapphire. So for a billion dollars, it seems like an investment that would take decades to pay for itself.

I wonder if it's something they could use in other things that don't currently use Gorilla Glass, like macbook screens?

That is interesting, and would absolutely justify a billion dollar investment if that is their intention, because they would need a metric shitton of sapphire to pull that off. My guess is its just for the iPhone/iTouch screens, because the idea is already out there and being used for mobile device screens, and Apple sells a lot of iPhones, which I think would amount to enough sapphire needed to make it worth it to the Apple bean counters.

Re:Well.

[viperidaenz]

a metric shitton of sapphire

Exactly. Not one of those ill-defined imperial long shit tons and short shit tons.

Re:Well.

[plover]

Make it harder sells it better
Work 'em faster Apple's stronger
More than ever iPhone after
iPod works the Android over

Re:Well.

[Guspaz]

Corning owns Gorilla Glass, though, so that wouldn't help Apple increase their vertical integration. TFA does mention that there is work in that direction going on, though.

Re:Well.

[Mr0bvious]

I'm certainly no materials expert but anecdotal evidence does not support your hypothesis.

Most plastic is less scratch resistant than most glass. Most glass is less shatter resistant than most plastics.

Therefore I conclude that: scratch resistance != measure of shatter resistence.

Re:Well.

[viperidaenz]

Looks like scratch resistence != shatter resistence.

Secondly, it means overcoming a surprising problem: despite its hardness, synthetic sapphire can be prone to fracturing, at almost any point in this finishing process, due to impurities or to the presence of unresolved strains in the crystalline structure.

“That’s something that’s being very carefully measured and tested,” says Stone-Sunderberg. “Fracturing is probably of the highest concern. If a product is released with a more expensive touch screen [cover] and consumers experience fracturing, they’re going to be highly disappointed. It would be devastating to the sapphire industry.”

Also, the tensile strength of regular glass (which varies considerably however) can match that of synthetic sapphire. Sapphire has very good compression stength though.
This is the reason for steel reinforced concrete. You can't easily compress concrete but you can pull it apart pretty easily. If you add steel with its good tensile strength, you get a strong material that excels in both areas.

Apple will need to do something with the sapphire or it will shatter with the slighest bend. Watch faces don't have this problem because they're relitively thick. You can't piss away millimetres in thickness and weight when it comes to the next gen smart phone.

Re:Well.

[lgw]

Gorilla glass cracks anyway. First time I drop a phone, there goes the glass. But it also scratches. It's far softer than sand, so in arid areas the grit that gets everywhere can scratch your phone in your pocket. Sapphire at least has that going for it - there's little in everyday life that can scratch it.

Re:Well.

[lgw]

Why do expensive watches have sapphire crystals? Well, sapphire has advantages, but mostly because those watches are jewelry that happen to tell time.

Why will iPhones have sapphire screens? Because they are jewelry that happen to make phone calls. If you see Apple products as fashion accessories first, then sapphire screens are a brilliant idea.

Re:Well.

[ceoyoyo]

Sapphire is almost certainly more scratch resistant, because it's harder. Gorilla glass may well be less likely to break, since it's not as hard. Scratch and break resistance are usually difficult to get together. You're right, the real question is, in the real world, which is the more important property? Are scratches or breaks more common? Can other design features mitigate scratches or breaks more effectively?

I would think some rubber buffer around the glass could be used to add a lot of break resistance. Other than putting a film over the screen, scratches are pretty hard to prevent without making the surface itself more resistant.

Re:Well.

[ceoyoyo]

Really? You got modded up for that?

Expensive watches have sapphire faces because sapphire is one of the hardest materials that can be made into a thin, transparent sheet for a reasonable price. That makes it very scratch resistant. It's not bling, it's very practical.

Re:Well.

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a $150 watch that has a sapphire crystal and titanium case. The watch case is significantly scratched and the crystal is not scratched at all. Definitely not bling and definitely practical. And not expensive (the replacement cost of the crystal is $50).

Re:Well.

[Anonymous Coward]

You realize sandpaper grit *is* corundum, right?

Re:Well.

[gnupun]

Sapphire is second hardest material (1st is diamond) known and much more scratch resistant than gorilla glass. This is the best feature of sapphire glass. Check out the youtube video in this article -- even a concrete block can't scratch the sapphire glass. However, sapphire glass has many disadvantages:

• *10x more expensive than gorilla glass
• *1.6 times heavier than gorilla glass
• *Higher refractive index so it's dimmer and therefore consumes more battery power to get same brightness as gorilla glass. A phone user is very interested in this property.
• *Not environmentally friendly (energy consumption very high to produce glass)

Re:Well.

[MrNemesis]

Silicon carbide at least has potential; there's a synthetic polymorph of it called Moissanite that's transparent, harder (9.5 vs. 9) and stronger than sapphire/corundum. I imagine it costs a shedload more to make than sapphire glass however.

Re:Well.

[MachineShedFred]

It requires a shload of heat, which takes energy. The environmental claim is regarding the production of this energy, which Apple has no problem building large solar arrays to get around that.

Re:Well.

[Anonymous Coward]

I would think some rubber buffer around the glass could be used to add a lot of break resistance.

rubber doesn't really go with apple's metal and glass stylistic sensibilities.

You just don't get the same sensation with that rubber buffer around your...oh wait, sorry, wrong forum.

Re:Well.

[BasilBrush]

I can't believe the "dimmer" argument has an real validity given that sapphire is widely used for camera lenses, where any significant dimming would be a problem.

Should have gone with ruby....

[BenJeremy]

...transparent aluminum! Clearly, Apple hates Star Trek.

Re:Should have gone with ruby....

[zifnabxar]

Rubies are sapphires, just with higher levels of chromium which makes them appear red. Maybe that's why Apple doesn't like them.

Re:Should have gone with ruby....

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Obviously, Apple doesn't want any of that Chromium stuff in their app store.

Re:Should have gone with ruby....

[catmistake]

(b) No true Scotsman would say aluminum, but aluminium.

FTFY.

I guess you forgot where you were.

Anyone else notice

[rsilvergun]

that you can go from jack squat to worlds largest producer in a few years? I'm not saying they aren't gonna do it, I'm just saying it's crazy how fast their doing it. 50 years ago this would be a massive undertaking with a whole town built up around it. Now? I think the factory's gonna have a couple hundred employees. It's just nuts how few people you need in manufacturing anymore...

Re:Anyone else notice

[viperidaenz]

You can go from jack squat to anything with a billion dollars.
Especially when the rest of the industry isn't all that large.

It's a design problem, not materials.

[aXis100]

How about they just design a phone that doesn't shatter when you drop it? Having the glass right to the edges might look nice but it's completely unpractical from a robustness point of view. Apple are just fashion victims.

My motorola Defy+ has a thin plastic bezel that doesnt degrade its appearance yet absorbs those nasty corner shocks. Simple design to solve a common problem and doesnt require building an expensive saphire factory.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[plover]

But it's ... it's not ... cool.

Apparently what is cool is to buy a gaudy plastic band to wrap around the edge to make up for this design defect, then bedazzle the shit out of it.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[ebno-10db]

Hear, hear!

It seems like most of the IPhones I see have broken screens, but other phones only rarely. It's just a shitty design. Excuse me, I now have to go underground before the Apple fanboys catch up with me.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[GrahamCox]

How about they just design a phone that doesn't shatter when you drop it?

Yeah, they could, I dunno, make a harder kind of glass that doesn't shatter. Sounds familiar.

The point is that the Motorola design might be a cheaper solution, bit the phone simply looks shittier. Some people, presumably yourself, don't care about that, but plenty of others do. It's the sort of thing that makes a Mercedes a Mercedes, and a Lexus a not-quite-right knock off of the same thing.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[ceoyoyo]

That's because the other phones don't continue to function after their screens get broken. :P

I've actually broken a couple of iPhone screens. They seem to survive the corner and edge drops just fine, but the face down drops onto concrete or an uneven stone floor breaks the screen. Still works fine though, which is impressive.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[Anonymous Coward]

iPhone glass doesn't go all the way to the edge. The metal ring around the iPhone is the edge, and it absorbs nasty corner shocks just fine. SquareTrade, whose job it is to keep up on this shit (since they pay out the insurance claims) consistently rates the iPhone as less breakable than its Android counterparts.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[iroll]

My NexusS has a plastic bezel and it shattered from a 2-ft drop onto a faux-wood (read: not that hard) surface.

Because our anti-anecdotes would annihilate each other in a flash of light, you're going to have to come up with a better line of reasoning.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[aXis100]

Supposedly the NexusS doesnt use gorilla glass, so it is much weaker anyway.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[GauteL]

It seems like most of the IPhones I see have broken screens, but other phones only rarely.

I'll counter your anecdote with one of my own. I've seen dozens of iPhones in the hands of friends and co-workers. Only one of them ever had broken glass (the back panel) and that was in the hands of one of the biggest drunks I've ever known.

You simply only notice what you want to notice.

Re:It's a design problem, not materials.

[Solandri]

Funny that you should bring up a car analogy. In the 1940s and 1950s, as cars began to get faster, more people started dying in accidents. As a result, manufacturers started building the car bodies to be stronger and more rigid. Of course when we started doing systematic crash testing in the 1960s and 1970s, we found out that this was absolutely the worst possible thing they could have done. With a rigid body, the entire force the impact is transferred to the occupants. The car stops immediately, while the passengers keep going... until they hit the front of the car at full speed. The better solution was to design a strong passenger compartment and belt the occupants to it, while the rest of the car was designed to deform and shatter to lengthen deceleration times (decreasing peak acceleration forces) and dissipate energy. Which is actually what a phone with a plastic body and a metal internal frame does.

Anyhow, I think Samsung and LG are on the right track here. The electronics inside a phone can survive several hundred Gs (you can literally shoot them out of a cannon with little ill effect). The only fragile part is the glass screen. So both companies are working hard to develop flexible screens. The only remaining issue would then be scratching the screen; but most people seem content to put a cheap plastic protector on their screen to ward off scratches.

Silicon on Sapphire

[blinkenlights1]

Sapphire has a lot of uses besides the purely cosmetic - Perhaps the worlds biggest electronics innovator actually is targeting a future electronics requirement - Better RF, better sensors

The big secret?

[fustakrakich]

They're making phonograph needles...

It's about time

[Animats]

It's surprising that Apple didn't do this a long time ago. Checkout scanners have had sapphire-coated glass for a decade or more. I pointed this out a few years ago, and the Apple fanboys immediately replied that Gorilla Glass was good enough and sapphire was unnecessary.

It's embarassing how fragile Apple's mobile products are. But this, at least, will stop screens from being scratched by coins and keys. You can drag canned goods across a sapphire coated supermarket checkout scanner glass for a decade without much effect. Home Depot self-checkout scanners have sapphire coated glass, and they get everything in the tool department dragged across them.

Substrates

[grrrl]

Sapphire is not just for external materials, it is also a commonly used substrate for growth of various semiconductors for a range of devices (main substrate for GaN (blue LEDs), silicon on sapphire (SOS) tech). There are many reasons to use it as a substrate (transparent, radiation resistant, excellent thermal conductivity but low electrical conductivity) though some disadvantages which have largely been accounted for (poor lattice match to Si, GaN).

We used to get GaN grown on piddly little 2" sapphire wafers, which were themselves to start with hideously expensive. Growing on larger sapphire wafers is very interesting (think of how most production fabs are geared for 12" Si wafers).

Before you know it you may also find internal components made from material grown on sapphire made by Apple in Apple products.

Gorilla Glass is pretty strong

[SuperKendall]

It's surprising that Apple didn't do this a long time ago.

It's not if you read the article and know more about the costs Sapphire have traditionally added.

It's embarassing how fragile Apple's mobile products are.

You mean, the ones that use the same Gorilla Glass everyone else is using?

Sapphire does sound nice, but you are selling Gorilla Glass way short. It can take a lot of pounding, and I haven't had keys (or anything else) be able to scratch the display in years. I recall a model of the iPhone a few years ago where a YouTube review showed things like shaking the phone in a bag of keys, and the screen was untouched.

I have no doubt whatever comes next will be better, but I wouldn't say mobile devices suffer from overly delicate screens anymore.

Bullshit - don't believe marketing materials

[Wdi]

Sapphire is *not* the second hardest material known. Yes, it's written in the linked article, but it is also definitely wrong. It is hard, and it is harder than glass. That is all there is. Besides diamond. many other materials, such as some forms of boronnitride, rhenium and osmium borides, and a collection of carbon/boron/nitrogen mixed compounds are all far harder than sapphire.

Re:Bullshit - don't believe marketing materials

[Plumpaquatsch]

Sapphire is *not* the second hardest material known. Yes, it's written in the linked article, but it is also definitely wrong.

Maybe they mean second hardest transparent material - which is kind of important for displays.

Not just jewelry

[AlKaMo]

One of the largest uses for artificial sapphire is supermarket barcode scanners. No one's putting it there because they feel a need to bling-out the supermarket. It's there because any surface that has stuff dragged across it all day, every day either needs to be incredible scratch-resistant or replaced way too often.