*Rumour* Apple to start designing it's own batteries

[Belgarathian]

Apple has hired Soonho Ahn from Samsung SDI which supplied Apple with Li-ion batteries and has supposedly discussed purchasing cobalt from mines. Apple, particularly with the iPhone in recent years, has been on a crusade to in-house design of as many components as possible having more recently taken the design of the GPU for it's A series processors and now it seems continues the theme with the design and potential manufacturing of it's own batteries.

 

An example of Apple's design 'innovation'

 

 

My take? Could be a good move. There's a few of reasons for this:

 

• The iPhone slow-down fiasco and quality control of battery cells caused the company a bit of a PR nightmare, taking the design in house gives Apple a firmer hand in the design, manufacturing, and supply of their battery cells and if done well, the durability, consistency, and longevity.
• Increased density = smaller battery. More room for activities... headphone jack... They'll make the iPhone thinner and even lighter than ever before.
• We've seen how well this has worked for Tesla with them having the lowest cost battery packs of any BEV manufacturer despite having enormous volumes of cells. Part of this has to do with their continued investment in battery technology which means they use less rare materials and have better density than their competitors. Could Apple do the same? Yeah. Actually they could buy Tesla with their liquid assets so I'm fairly confident they'll be able to develop a competitive battery cell for small devices if this is true.

 

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/01/apple-hires-a-samsung-battery-exec-suggesting-it-may-make-its-own-batteries/

[Commodus]

If they do, I'm looking forward to it.  Apple tends to get involved when it believes it can do a better job than an outside partner, and typically it does.  I'm still amused at how the A-series chips are now so much faster that Qualcomm probably won't outperform the A12 until 2020... if it can translate that determination to batteries, it could have a clear edge on longevity, too.

[ARikozuM]

Here's to hoping we get another device like the SE or 5-series (yes, thiccer is better). 

[captain_to_fire]

Yay for Apple becoming the first vertical monopoly 

[ARikozuM]

1 minute ago, captain_to_fire said:

Yay for Apple becoming the first vertical monopoly 

I think Samsung's explosives were vertical enough. 

[mrchow19910319]

hearing them designing batteries is one thing, how long is it gonna take for them to actually implement those techs into the newer gen iphones?? 4 years ?? 3 years??

I am curious..

[suicidalfranco]

so making it harder to replace batteries like they did with the macs 

[williamcll]

Custom batteries will make third party repairs hard.

[NeuesTestament]

5 hours ago, williamcll said:

Custom batteries will make third party repairs hard.

This is probably one of the reasons they are doing it. Apple wants to make third party repairs impossible in order to have even bigger margins.

[Ashley MLP Fangirl]

this turned into an APPLE BAD REEE thread after 8 replies. congratulations.

 

 

on topic though, if Apple is getting involved it thinks it can do better than everyone else. let's see if that's the case here.

[Doobeedoo]

Well yeah, benefits of in-house design fot components.

Though really wish to see that we get a new mainstream battery tech already. Not prone to be dangerous, chargest much faster, last much longer for same size. 

[Blademaster91]

4 hours ago, NeuesTestament said:

This is probably one of the reasons they are doing it. Apple wants to make third party repairs impossible in order to have even bigger margins.

Yeah its probably the biggest reason they are doing it, to make it impossible for the user and third party to buy the custom batteries, and likely sue third party for buying parts from another source since Apple has done that before.

[79wjd]

2 hours ago, Blademaster91 said:

Yeah its probably the biggest reason they are doing it, to make it impossible for the user and third party to buy the custom batteries, and likely sue third party for buying parts from another source since Apple has done that before.

There are much easier ways to restrict batteries to just those installed by Apple than deciding to invest money into an entire battery division.

[Commodus]

3 hours ago, Blademaster91 said:

Yeah its probably the biggest reason they are doing it, to make it impossible for the user and third party to buy the custom batteries, and likely sue third party for buying parts from another source since Apple has done that before.

To echo what 79wjd said: you do realize the ludicrousness of what you're saying, right?  That Apple would start making its own batteries primarily to discourage third-party outlets from offering cheaper repairs?  Even if the third-party battery market was large enough to be a problem, this team is likely trying to find ways to extend battery life, making replacements less likely in the first place.  Not a strategy you'd take if you were trying to drive replacement purchases through your own channels.

[mynameisjuan]

7 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Not a strategy you'd take if you were trying to drive replacement purchases through your own channels

Thats exactly what you do. If they block 3rd parties, people are forced to go to Apple. 

 

If they really wanted to extend life they would contact Samsung. Their new redesigns are proving pretty solid with battery degradation. 

[CarlBar]

6 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Thats exactly what you do. If they block 3rd parties, people are forced to go to Apple. 

 

If they really wanted to extend life they would contact Samsung. Their new redesigns are proving pretty solid with battery degradation. 

 

You do realise how expensive this is going to be. If all they wanted was hard to acquire battery designs they could commission a custom layout from a whole range of sources. The only reason to go in house is if you want somthing you can't pay someone else to do.

[mynameisjuan]

Just now, CarlBar said:

 

You do realise how expensive this is going to be. If all they wanted was hard to acquire battery designs they could commission a custom layout from a whole range of sources. The only reason to go in house is if you want somthing you can't pay someone else to do.

Yeah but its Apple. It will be its own design, more expensive and not reliable for a few years of testing. 

 

If you add up RMAs and possible loss of sales, it would of been a hell of a lot cheaper just to outsource to Samsung.  

[Blademaster91]

1 hour ago, 79wjd said:

There are much easier ways to restrict batteries to just those installed by Apple than deciding to invest money into an entire battery division.

The lengths that Apple already goes to stop repairs, it wouldn't be surprising at all.

15 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Thats exactly what you do. If they block 3rd parties, people are forced to go to Apple. 

 

If they really wanted to extend life they would contact Samsung. Their new redesigns are proving pretty solid with battery degradation. 

Yeah its what Apple has done before with screens and replacement batteries, and all they would have to do is use higher capacity batteries, Apple probably doesn't want to use Samsung or pay more for their battery designs.

[CarlBar]

5 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Yeah but its Apple. It will be its own design, more expensive and not reliable for a few years of testing. 

 

If you add up RMAs and possible loss of sales, it would of been a hell of a lot cheaper just to outsource to Samsung.  

 

And you know all of this how exactly? C'mon show me the pricing figures involved in both options.

 

As has been pointed out we allready know of one company, (Tesla), that did this and saw a significant uptick in capability per price as a result so we know it's possibble for it to be cheaper for apple.

 

Really what it comes down to is what apple specifically wants from it's custom batteries vs what suppliers are willing to do 3rd party for them. Custom form factor, sure, full blown R&D, not so much, (if you paying for the R&D your going to want exclusive access to the product that results, (and i 100% cannot complain at any company for that, they paid for the damn thing), but no battery division of any company in the world is gonna settle for that).

[79wjd]

19 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

The lengths that Apple already goes to stop repairs, it wouldn't be surprising at all.

But there are easier and much cheaper ways to do that. It wouldn't make sense to invest the kind of money they would need to invest just to gain a bit more money from battery replacements. It could be a secondary effect, sure, but it no way would it make sense as a primary motivator.

 

[BuckGup]

This is great news. Look at Tesla compared to other EVs. Sure it is going to make 3rd party repair harder but also people can just reverse engineer it and now everyone can have better batteries. If we had better batteries most of the worlds problems could be solved

[Guest]

Hm. What I would be really interested in would be if they made their own processor for the Macbooks or even iMacs.

[Commodus]

1 hour ago, mynameisjuan said:

Thats exactly what you do. If they block 3rd parties, people are forced to go to Apple. 

 

If they really wanted to extend life they would contact Samsung. Their new redesigns are proving pretty solid with battery degradation. 

Er, no, it's not.  The money it gets from steering third-party battery replacements to Apple is unlikely to be worth the cost of launching a battery division and designing custom hardware.  And like I said, if it's designing its own batteries, it's likely not just a simple part swap, it's to improve the batteries themselves... which would lead to fewer replacements.

 

I know some people on this forum like to pretend that everything Apple does is a sinister conspiracy to screw users, but given that Apple has always brought tech in-house primarily to improve it at rates partners couldn't offer, I'd say "making better batteries" is the far more plausible explanation.

[mynameisjuan]

2 minutes ago, Commodus said:

Er, no, it's not.  The money it gets from steering third-party battery replacements to Apple is unlikely to be worth the cost of launching a battery division and designing custom hardware.  And like I said, if it's designing its own batteries, it's likely not just a simple part swap, it's to improve the batteries themselves... which would lead to fewer replacements.

 

I know some people on this forum like to pretend that everything Apple does is a sinister conspiracy to screw users, but given that Apple has always brought tech in-house primarily to improve it at rates partners couldn't offer, I'd say "making better batteries" is the far more plausible explanation.

Ok so Apple will just say ok we are making batteries now and they will be better right? If they were to do this right they would drop the current manufacture and switch to Samsung temporarily until they had substantial testing. 

 

I get you think Apple will sprinkle magic dust on these and improve them better than any battery on the market, but get real. Its a part swap at best. 

[Commodus]

9 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Ok so Apple will just say ok we are making batteries now and they will be better right? If they were to do this right they would drop the current manufacture and switch to Samsung temporarily until they had substantial testing. 

 

I get you think Apple will sprinkle magic dust on these and improve them better than any battery on the market, but get real. Its a part swap at best. 

You're purposefully ignoring what Apple has done in the past.

 

When Apple introduced the A4, its first custom chip, it wasn't that big a break from the reference ARM design.  It looked like not much more than a "part swap."  But then something happened: the more Apple iterated on its architecture, the more sharply it diverged from the common design and the more conspicuous the advantages became.  It's now to the point where the iPhone XS is likely to be faster than all 2019 Android phones in most respects.

 

I don't think Apple will "sprinkle magic dust."  But to assume that they won't or can't improve on their battery technology is just as wrong given historical evidence, and says more about your irrational hatred of Apple than anything.