Robert Bosch GmbH has won orders from Apple Inc to supply the next iPhone with some of its motion sensors, according to a person familiar with the deal.
It is a potential blow to InvenSense Inc, the main supplier of those smartphone components.
The change — hinted at by InvenSense’s chief financial officer in August last year — comes as the San Jose, California-based maker of motion-sensing chips seeks to complete its US$1.3 billion sale to TDK Corp, a deal partly aimed at boosting the Japanese company’s business with Apple.
Photo: Reuters
Bosch might supply as much as half of these components for the new iPhone, with InvenSense supplying the rest, the person said.
Bosch already supplies barometric pressure sensors for the iPhone, according to product teardowns by iFixit and other firms that analyze the guts of gadgets.
“People believe that the acquisition is going to go through,” Robert W. Baird analyst Tristan Gerra said. “The share loss scenario may be something that TDK had already considered.”
Rather than an existing revenue stream from supplying Apple, TDK might be more interested in InvenSense’s suite of technologies suited to growth areas like driverless cars, drones and the Internet of Things.
The risks of losing Apple as a customer were highlighted by chip developer Imagination Technologies PLC, which last month said that the iPhone maker would stop using its intellectual property within two years.
Apple chief executive officer Tim Cook tries to source components from at least two suppliers, making it easier to negotiate cheaper prices. Apple accounts for about 60 percent of InvenSense’s revenue, according to Bloomberg supply chain analysis.
Apple is expected to unveil a major upgrade to the iPhone later this year to mark the 10th anniversary of the groundbreaking device. Analysts expect consumers to buy millions of the new gadgets, generating huge orders for component suppliers.
The components produced by Bosch and InvenSense contain gyroscopes and accelerometers. Gyroscopes can tell if a phone is being held horizontally or vertically, being shaken, or pointing in a particular direction. An accelerometer detects different movements, such as side-to-side motion. Together, the sensors help measure step count, and they are useful for mobile games and augmented reality applications. In the iPhone 6S and iPhone 7, these were supplied exclusively by InvenSense, according to teardowns.
InvenSense chief financial officer Mark Dentinger said at an August investor conference that as recently as 2014 it was dominant “by a considerable margin” at the top end of the smartphone market.
“We’re still the largest player, but we are splitting some share now with our primary competitor,” he said. “Historically, it’s unlikely that most of our customers will have just one supplier over a long, long period of time.”
TDK, which rose to prominence on cassette tapes in the 1970s, has since expanded into batteries, automotive components and now the Internet of Things. The Tokyo-based company received regulatory clearance to acquire InvenSense on April 18.
“We aim to become a strong player in the sensor business with InvenSense as our perfect partner,” TDK CEO Shigenao Ishiguro said at the time.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”