The long-term and complicated relationship between Apple and rival Samsung has taken another turn – it looks like the competitor won’t be manufacturing the processor chip for the iPhone 7.
According to a report the chip, likely to be known as the A10 will be made solely by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), which won the contract due to its 10-nanometer manufacturing process.
For the iPhone 6s’ A9 chip, the production was split between TSMC and Samsung. However, there was controversy when third-party benchmark tests reported TSMC’s chip as more efficient than Samsung’s by a significant margin. Apple’s own tests eventually showed that it was only 2-3%
Read more: Chipgate – is there such a thing as a ‘bad’ iPhone?
Could this be enough to sway them towards a TSMC only production pipeline? Quite possibly, though it’s likely that if Apple could, it would avoid working with Samsung due to their fragmented history.
The chips are expected to go into production in June, with the view to be ready for the iPhone 7’s likely launch in September 2016.
Source: MacRumors