The iPhone 6 was supposed to have a sapphire display. More than a year ago, Apple turned to GT Advanced Technologies, the now-bankrupt supplier, to solve its longstanding problems with scratched and cracked displays. But as soon as the two companies signed an agreement, their relationship became riddled with complications. In the ensuing year, as chronicled in detail by the Wall Street Journal, everything shifted. Apple originally wanted to buy furnaces with which to make sapphire itself, before changing its mind and deciding to simply buy the produced sapphire from GT. But GT couldn't make sapphire at the volume and quantity Apple wanted, and the relationship splintered over and over until it broke.
The Journal's story is full of remarkable details, like the almost-loss of 500 sapphire bricks worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Or the 700 people GT hired as a result of the project, many of whom wound up with nothing at all to do. It's also full of what should have been obvious red flags, like the fact that three days before GT signed its deal with Apple, it produced 578 pounds of sapphire — and not one ounce was usable.
But it's fundamentally a story about the power, and the danger, that comes from working with Apple. Tim Cook and his team in Cupertino demanded high quality and low prices, which make it a difficult partner to work with profitably. The prospect of making massive amounts of sapphire for the world's most valuable technology company was too hard for GT to pass up, even though its inexperience and inability to scale ultimately cost the company much more than the nearly $1 billion that was invested in the project. Apple and GT worked together to help GT stay financially solvent, but it was too late; GT filed for bankruptcy barely two weeks after the iPhone 6 was released — without a sapphire screen. In bankruptcy court, the two companies blamed each other for the failure. In truth, it seems clear both partners are to blame.
Sapphire screens are an obvious, tested improvement over the materials used in smartphone displays around the world. But if GT's story is any indication, not even Apple can find an easy way to make one of the hardest materials on earth.
Comments
It’s worst than that, supposedly their executives knew from the get they couldn’t meet demand and cashed out their stocks as proof.
By Jason Diaz on 11.19.14 6:09pm
I thought that this story broke a week ago or more…and the WSJ’s article put Apple in a far more negative light than David Pierce has. It’s not that Apple is difficult to work with. The accusations are that they are malicious.
By kedmond on 11.20.14 10:35am
This article plays to a kinder, gentler Apple.
GT was set up to fail from the get go. A year of R&D. A scalable product/process. These could have been the face of the next gen iDevice.
Then again, I would never count out the "glass" makers.
By Rhonin on 11.20.14 1:36pm
it’s The Verge…
By theSUBVERSIVEBIRDS on 11.21.14 7:03pm
Tough crowd. I thought this was interesting, David – thanks for the write-up.
By kylealden on 11.19.14 6:12pm
I think most of the comments are criticizing the factual inaccuracies of the article. For example, Apple has never said that the sapphire crystals were for the iPhone 6. Another issue is the "test" linked to by the article is an anecdote at best, and even more importantly, not even a sapphire screen. If it was, it wouldn’t be scratched by sandpapers in the video.
An enjoyable read doesn’t mean facts should go out the window.
By DavidPJTopolsky on 11.19.14 10:15pm
You must not have read the source article…
The WSJ makes it pretty clear that the original plan was to use sapphire for the new iPhones.
By rahulp on 11.19.14 10:59pm
In fairness, the article is paywalled, so they probably indeed have not read it.
By KeithZG on 11.20.14 4:07am
But the linked video has nothing to do with sapphire glass, Apple has never produced such iPhone 6 part.
What was shown is regular Gorilla Glass 3 cover for iPhone 6. It is hard enough to withstand the keys and the knife, so the only way you would see difference if you would use sand or emery paper for testing, which the guy did not use.
So his whole claim that he got sapphire cover for iPhone 6 is bogus.
By DERSS on 11.20.14 7:45am
That’s a poor excuse, there’s another comment on this thread explaining how to get around the paywall. It took me 10 seconds to get to the full article. Without paying WSJ.
from BrianG2k below:
Or instead of all that, Google "WSJ Apple Sapphire" and click the link that says, "Inside Apple’s Broken Sapphire Factory" it’s the first one for me after the WSJ ad.
By rahulp on 11.20.14 10:10am
Yeah, that did bugger-all for me. I still hit the paywall, and now the search results are polluted with tech blogs reblogging the (still-paywalled) article.
By trost79muh on 11.20.14 11:40am
I find it to difficult to believe you because I’ve done it twice now with no issue either time. Seems to work for other people on here too…are you sure you’re doing it right? I suppose they could block it by region or country, are you in the US or elsewhere?
By rahulp on 11.20.14 11:55am
Not in the USA. That may be it. And don’t be so quick to disbelieve :-P
By trost79muh on 11.20.14 2:02pm
Fair enough, sorry.
I should have known you weren’t in the US, "bugger-all" is not a phrase I hear in any part of this country :P
By rahulp on 11.20.14 3:58pm
Going straight to the Wall Street Journal main page or a different article, and then trying to go to the "Inside Apple…" article takes me to the paywall, but if I click the link in Google that says "Inside Apple’s Broken Sapphire Factory – Wall Street Journal" I get the full article.
By rahulp on 11.20.14 12:01pm
By KeithZG on 11.20.14 4:14am
For the people that didn’t read it, that’s a quote from the Wall Street Journal article.
By rahulp on 11.20.14 10:13am
Uh.. Why did I click this link? The inside story.. is over at the WSJ, which I don’t have a subscription to.
By JetSetRez on 11.19.14 6:14pm
open link. copy wsj headline. paste into google. click on article and read.
By BrianG2k on 11.19.14 6:17pm
Thanks for the tip!
By wormeyman on 11.19.14 7:25pm
WTH. How does the WSJ allow that?
Do they have a deal with Google?
By Tikigawd on 11.19.14 8:29pm
Because actual WSJ readers rather pay for the content they consume.
By titaniumalloy on 11.19.14 9:39pm
What? I’m juts wondering why the WSJ allows that workaround…
I’m not asking about WSJ customers and their mindset.
By Tikigawd on 11.20.14 2:00pm
The same can be done with the NYT.
They know about the loophole, and they’re perfectly fine with it.
By llamas612 on 11.19.14 10:39pm
The NYT has been closing loopholes with regularity as they discover them. For example, they now count articles on mobile. You can no longer just clear your desktop cookies and reset the counter. You can no longer read forever in incognito mode.
They’ll eventually close this loophole too.
By badasscat1 on 11.20.14 3:02am