Besides OLED Screen, Samsung To Supply Apple Display Drive Chip For iPhone 8

Apple and Samsung remain bitter rivals when it comes to patents and market leadership, but their years-long business relationship continues despite about 40 lawsuits between the two tech giants since 2011. From supplying A9 chipsets for Apple’s iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S Plus, Samsung would now supply not only OLED screens but also display drive chips for the iPhone 8.

Besides Samsung, Apple has also tapped two other South Korean companies to manufacture the OLED display for the iPhone 8, the upcoming flagship. The two other Korean firms are BH and Interflex. To meet the high demand for the OLED screens, since Apple plans to have 60 million iPhone 8 with the organic light-emitting diode screens in 2017, Samsung would expand its Electro-Mechanic plant in Vietnam.

Beyond China

With these developments, the iPhone 8 would no longer be made in Apple’s facility in China, particularly in Foxconn. Besides the addition of South Korea, Vietnam would also be included in the list. Other than the screen, Samsung Display and other suppliers under Samsung System LSI – which makes application processors and camera sensors – would also manufacture the iPhone 8’s display driver chip, Phone Arena reports.

The chip on film that connects it to a flexible printed circuit board would be made by Korean firms LG Innotek and STEMCO. The printed circuit board, in turn, would come from Interflex, BH, and Electro-Mechanic. Other made-in-Korea parts to be used on iPhone 8 are the camera modules from LG Innotek and memory chips from Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.

Google Wants A Cut From Apple Pie

Since Samsung controls 95 percent of the OLED screen market, BGR reports that Google wants to break the near-monopoly by investing almost $1 billion in OLED facilities of LG Display in a bid to have a larger slice of the Apple iPhone 8 pie as the Cupertino-based tech giant shifts to OLED for all its iPhones by 2019. LG confirms it has received a request to participate in bidding to supply Apple small- and medium-sized OLEDs.

Samsung, however, remains the bulk supplier since Apple, which acquired 14 percent of the total global OLED panel production in 2017, reportedly entered into a $2.6-billion three-year supply deal with Samsung for 70 million OLED displays, 9TO5Mac reports.