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Apple Might Start Making Its Own Batteries For iPhones, Macs (bloomberg.com)
Apple has hired an executive from the battery-making division of Samsung to help lead its own battery work. The new hire suggests that the company might start making its own batteries for iPhones and Macs. Bloomberg reports: Soonho Ahn joined Apple in December as global head of battery developments, after working as a senior vice president at Samsung SDI since 2015, according to his LinkedIn profile. At Samsung SDI, Ahn led development of lithium battery packs and worked on "next-generation" battery technology, the profile says. Apple has used batteries from Samsung SDI to power its own products in the past. The iPhone maker has been trying to reduce reliance on third-party components, and the notable battery technology hire suggests it may be doing the same for batteries. Apple has been working on its own MicroLED display technology for future devices, which would help wean itself off Samsung in other areas. It's also increasingly building its own processors and is investigating the development of its own cellular modems.
I wonder if Apple will develop its own battery format (iBattery ?!?). If they do, I guess that it will be patented and not freely available on the market as a single piece. And so we can say bye-bye to the "right to repair"....
Apple has always relied on differentiating its products with unique hardware.
You mean unique software. Apple is at its core a software company. This seems counter-intuitive until you think about it for a minute. The hardware in most Apple devices is at best superficially different from the competition and Apple doesn't even manufacture it. Oh they make a big stink about their design as a marketing ploy but it isn't what really makes their products distinct. You can (and I have) put Windows on a Macintosh and the experience is not meaningfully different than on a Dell or HP. Apple differentiates their products primarily through their software. If a Macintosh was sold with Windows they would be unable to command the profit margins they currently do because their hardware is nice but it's not that different or better than their best competition. This is not my opinion either. Steve Jobs understood this thoroughly. I think the current management seems a bit confused about this point.
Increasingly their competitors are getting ahead now, with things like foldable screens looking like they will be huge and Apple mostly reduced to just removing stuff like the headphone jack.
Folding screens as they currently stand are a fad that is not ready for prime time. It's a solution looking for a problem. Have you actually seen any of these products? If they are big hits I'll be truly astonished. The idea of a folding device is a good one but the form factors they are throwing out there currently are crap. And if you think Apple isn't taking a hard look at this stuff you are crazy.
By developing their own screens, batteries, modems and other hardware they can differentiate themselves like they do with CPUs now.
Certainly they could do this but they'll have to take it a LOT further. And unless they can actually create an improved component (cost and/or features) then there is no reason for them to do it in house. I think carefully curated vertical integration is actually probably a very good idea for Apple like you suggest. Tesla and SpaceX have done this too good effect. Plus one of the problems Apple has is that they do such huge volumes that supply becomes a problem. It's easy to do a folding screen when you only sell a few tens of thousands of devices. Apple sells tens of millions of iPhones which means that simply getting enough of any given component is a huge problem. Vertical integration can be a very good way to handle this issue and I think Apple has outsourced perhaps a bit too much of their hardware manufacturing.