Foxconn to become Apple’s new sapphire supplier

Apple signed a deal with GT Advanced Technologies to create sapphire displays for the iPhone 6. Trusting an unproven supplier proved to be a fatal mistake, one that the Cupertino-based company likely won’t repeat anytime soon. A week ago, news surfaced that longtime manufacturing partner Foxconn was planning to spend $2.6 billion over the next two years to build a new display manufacturing plant. Although Foxconn didn’t reveal much about the plant, a spokesperson said that it is being built at the urgent request of a client for exclusive use.

Foxconn Technology Group, Apple’s main iPhone assembly partner, is reportedly gearing up to produce sapphire displays for Apple’s next generation of mobile devices, according to a report by China Economic Weekly cited by Focus Taiwan. Foxconn has reportedly reached an agreement to build a display factory on an over 300-acre plot of land adjacent to an iPhone 6 assembly plant in the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, where the company had been reported last month to be looking into such a facility. Just last week, Foxconn was also reported to be planning a new iPhone display plant in Taiwan. “The China Economic Weekly reported Tuesday that Foxconn has signed an agreement with the Zhengzhou city government in Henan Province, central China, to set up a display factory on a 133-hectare plot of land next to an iPhone 6 assembly plant. The new factory is expected to manufacture sapphire displays for the next generation of the Apple devices, the report said.”