MacRumors

Apple's spaceship-shaped campus in Cupertino, California is nearing completion, and most of the ring-shaped main structure and auxiliary buildings have been finished.

We've seen monthly drone updates of the location during the construction period, letting us keep an eye on Apple's progress, and now SkyIMD has created a neat high-resolution aerial mosaic that gives an incredibly detailed overall view of the nearly-finished campus.

Duncan Sinfield, who has shared Apple Campus 2 drone videos with MacRumors for several months, has also uploaded an updated video captured on Christmas morning that shows the progress Apple has made on landscaping in recent weeks.

In a lengthy new article posted online today, The New York Times has delved into the inner workings of Foxconn's major iPhone manufacturing plant in Zhengzhou, China, referred to locally as "iPhone City." The article describes how the facility became one of Apple's major global manufacturing plants, as well as the "hidden bounty of perks, tax breaks, and subsidies" uncovered behind the scenes of Foxconn's operations -- negotiations Apple said it is "not a party to."

Looking at the origins of Apple's move to production overseas, the article first details Steve Jobs' decision to manufacture the Macintosh in its facilities in Texas and California in the mid-1980s. Following the company's financial slump in the 1990s, Jobs upon his return made the decision to outsource production in places like China. Partnerships with the likes of Foxconn provided Apple with the "heft and expertise" to create products, including the original iPod, on a massive scale.

When Apple’s sales took off after the introduction of the iPod in 2001, Foxconn had the heft and expertise to meet the demand that accompanied each hit product. Foxconn’s factories could quickly produce prototypes, increase production and, during peak periods, hire hundreds of thousands of workers.

“They have brilliant tooling engineers, and they were willing to invest a lot to keep pace with Apple’s growth,” said Joe O’Sullivan, a former Apple executive who worked in Asia.

As the launch of the iPhone approached, Foxconn began scouting locations for a new facility around China and created an Olympic-level competition among cities to be the home of its new plant. Officials from various cities offered perks like discounted energy and transportation costs, lower social insurance payments, and over $1.5 billion in grants for factory construction and dorms for workers. After Zhengzhou was chosen, it only took a few months between the signing of the deal and the launch of assembly lines in August 2010.

The city created a special economic zone for the project and provided a $250 million loan to Foxconn. The local government also pledged to spend more than $10 billion to vastly expand the airport, just a few miles away from the factory.

“I was impressed,” said Jeff Williams, Apple’s chief operating officer, who was part of the early discussions about setting up a factory. “They were very focused.”

To create its cohesive export system, Foxconn insisted that the Zhengzhou facility be located within a "bonded zone." This allowed Foxconn to bypass China's stringent restrictions on foreign manufacturing and directly import and export iPhone components, which was further expedited thanks to the facility's purposeful proximity to a nearby airport.

The iPhone plant continued to ramp up, and in 2014 included 94 production lines for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 5s, with an estimated 230 million smartphones having been exported from Zhengzhou in the years it had been open. The government referred to it as "one of the nation's crucial export centers." With all of the work came a labor force "the size of a national army," who relied heavily on government subsidies and produced 500,000 iPhones a day at peak.

A crushing work force begins arriving for the early shift at 6:30 a.m. They travel by foot, by bus, by motor scooter and even by pedicab. They file steadily into dozens of factory sites, spread out across 2.2 square miles. At the peak, some 350,000 workers assemble, test and package iPhones — up to 350 a minute.

The government pays recruiters a subsidy for every worker they hire, Mr. Liu said. “If the demand is high, then they will pay more,” he said. “If the demand is low, then the payment will be low, too.”

One of the other major topics of the article centered around the help that Foxconn has received from the Chinese government in return for providing its services to Zhengzhou's financial and political surge over the years. Foxconn is said to receive a bonus for each export target it reaches, according to government records discovered by The New York Times, with subsidies totaling $56 million in the factory's first two years of iPhone manufacturing.

Foxconn, in a separate statement, said it was grateful for the support of the government, noting that it was “no different than similar tax breaks all companies get in locations around the world for major investments.”

In response to questions, Apple said it was aware of the government’s infrastructure support. But the company added that it had no knowledge of specific grants, subsidies or tax breaks given to its manufacturing partner.

Foxconn remains a loyal partner in Apple's manufacturing processes to this day, most recently considering expansion into the United States and gearing up to be a major supplier of the 2017 iPhone.

The rest of The New York Times' findings, discovered through over 100 interviews with factory workers, logistics handlers, truck drivers, tax specialists and current and former Apple executives, can be read in the full coverage here.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Samsung Display has again been rumored as the exclusive supplier of OLED panels for the 2017 iPhone, according to new claims made by sources in the Taiwan supply chain (via DigiTimes). Back in April, The Korea Herald reported that Samsung would supply Apple with OLED panels in 2017, furthering rumors from as early as January that Apple and Samsung were in talks for an OLED manufacturing partnership.

Next year's iPhone is said to come in 4.7-inch, 5.5-inch, and 5.8-inch sizes, with the last model believed to be the only iPhone with an OLED display. The OLED version's actual touch-sensitive screen real estate may in fact be closer to 5.5-inches, or possibly 5.1- and 5.2-inches, if the rumor of a curved display is true.

Samsung's current estimates place the company at manufacturing 20 million units per month, according to the supply chain sources. The company's shipments of OLED units are estimated to reach 590 million by 2019. As for benefits, OLED screens can be brighter, clearer, and lead to more energy efficient iPhones.

Samsung Display will become the exclusive supplier of AMOLED panels for use in Apple's new iPhone devices to be launched in 2017 and can supply 20 million units in maximum a month, according to Taiwan-based supply chain makers.

Apple will launch 4.7-, 5.5- and 5.8-inch new iPhone models in second-half 2017, with TFT-LCD panels to be used in the former two models and AMOLED for the 5.8-inch one, the sources said. Global shipments of the AMOLED iPhone in 2017 are estimated at 60-70 million units, the sources noted.

In a separate DigiTimes report posted today, Wistron is believed to be a potential third partner for the manufacturing of the 2017 iPhone, following Foxconn and Pegatron. Wistron was previously rumored to be part of Apple's diversification in its supply chain this year, but it seems like the company was left out of iPhone 7 manufacturing. In the past, Wistron helped supply the iPhone 5c and iPhone SE.

In a recent piece by The Wall Street Journal, hardware analyst Stephen Baker commented on the state of holiday sales figures for both Apple and Samsung. While many believed Apple would have it easy this season due to Samsung's Galaxy Note7 crisis, Baker said that "Apple's own lack of a wowing product this year" meant that woeful Note7 owners opted for other high-end Galaxy phones, and not the iPhone 7.

“Most of those who bought or wanted to buy a Note 7 opted for a different high-end Galaxy phone,” Mr. Baker said. “Samsung was able to fend off other Android competition, and Apple, too, thanks to Apple’s own lack of a wowing product this year.”

Apple decided to not release the first weekend sales numbers for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus back in September, because it felt the results were "no longer a representative metric" due to demand outweighing supply. Samsung officially halted sales of the Galaxy Note7 worldwide in early October, but another industry analyst, Chetan Sharma, continued Baker's thread by commenting on the iPhone 7's lack of "a compelling enough feature set," which wasn't enough to convince owners of potentially exploding Note7 devices to switch ecosystems.

“Apple has the strongest ecosystem, with its hardware, software and app and content stores,” said consumer tech and mobile industry consultant Chetan Sharma. “IPhone users looking for an upgrade stick with Apple. But in a year when Samsung dropped the ball in a huge way,” he said, Apple “didn’t have a phone with a compelling enough feature set to lure Samsung owners away.”

Earlier this week, Yahoo-owned mobile analytics firm Flurry released data surrounding the top device activations by manufacturer between 12/19 and 12/25, confirming that Apple was again at the top of the list with 44 percent activations, while Samsung came in second at 21 percent. In comparison to the previous year, Apple dropped from 49 percent and Samsung climbed slightly from 19 percent.

Ultimately, the two analysts admitted that both Apple and Samsung "made mistakes this year that cost them growth." Sharma said that "the timing couldn’t have been worse for Samsung and it couldn’t have been better for Apple. But the truth is neither company capitalized this year.”

In the first few days of December, financial firm Oppenheimer summed up the current negative cloud surrounding Apple -- fueled by mixed-to-negative consumer reception and its first revenue decline since 2003 -- and stated that the company could be heading into a "decade-long malaise" if it doesn't turn things around.

Apple CEO Tim Cook toured the New York Stock Exchange with his nephew this morning, where he took a few moments to do a quick interview with CNBC.

Cook said he couldn't comment on business when asked, but he told the interviewer that Apple has had a "great" holiday season. "It's been a great holiday," he said.

When questioned about Apple's recently released AirPods and the lack of available stock, Cook called the AirPods a "runaway success." "We're making them just as fast as we can," he said.

Introduced in mid-December, the first AirPods began shipping out to customers during the week of December 19th, the first day retail stores began carrying the accessory.

Reviews of AirPods have been largely positive, with customers praising the sound quality, battery life, ease of connectivity, and better than expected Bluetooth range, but some users have been having battery trouble with their Charging Case.

After the AirPods launched online and then arrived to the first set of customers earlier in December, some users have begun realizing that the charging case that comes with the headphones isn't holding Apple's advertised 24 hours of charge. In theory, the charging case should only lose noticeable amounts of charge when the AirPods are low on battery and recharging within the case, and when users flip the pack open to check battery levels or otherwise activate Bluetooth with a connected Apple device.

The unlucky set of users facing the battery issues, however, are noticing that the AirPods case drains by upwards of 40 percent in mere hours, with the AirPods at 100 percent inside and minimal Bluetooth activation.

While some feared this is just the way Apple intended the headphones and companion charging case to work, Redditor severinskulls has posted about his experience with the problem, and the replacement AirPods he got that do not have an apparent faulty charging case. In most cases, the AirPods themselves are not facing any shortened battery life issues.

I was having the exact same issue you had. Airpods in case, go to bed with full charge and waking up with 15%-20% of the case charge gone. Thats a full charge cycle for the airpods themselves!

I spoke to apple support online. They had no answer how long the charge of the case should last when the airpods are not in use. They made an appointment for me instore as all diagnostics at the moment are being handled instore they said. Cut to this morning, go in for my appointment. The genius was very friendly. I was his first airpods case. Turns out he also has no info on whether this rate of the battery draining is normal. He said that definitely they are designed to lose charge over time as cycling the charge improves the health of the airpod batteries. However as I pointed out, going from a full charge to empty in two days while they are sitting there unused seems way too fast. To be safe, he placed my airpods. So i got a brand new pair.

The new AirPods Charging Case:

Sooooo I just checked. Airpods and case were 100% at 9pm last night. Checked just now at 9am the next morning and they are STILL at 100%, both the pods and the case. I had bluetooth on my phone on all night too. With the other pair in the same situation, I would have lost 14-20% charge by now.

So there we go, case closed (pun?), there is a battery life problem suffered by the airpods. I'm going to write back feedback to apple now. You should get your airpods replaced because they shouldnt lose as much charge as what youre experiencing.

When the AirPods first came out, the initial impressions of the battery life for both the headphones and the charging case were overall positive. A handful of MacRumors forum members were fans of the speedy charge rate of the AirPods, the granular settings of the iOS battery widget, and the battery life of the charging case as well. Mentions of battery drainage issues with the AirPods case began about a week ago, around the time the first customers had been using the headphones for a few days.

In a teardown last week by iFixit, it was theorized that the Charging Case was the cause of the AirPods' delay from October to December. The root of the problem was a few empty spaces discovered within the solder joints of the case's chip. This is referred to as "voiding," which iFixit said "could be evidence of low quality standards, or a rushed product release."

The exact scope of the affected AirPods user base is unclear. Some users are speculating that the problem could be an initial charge cycle hiccup that irons itself out over time, but a few owners that have had the AirPods since day one are still posting about battery drainage issues with the charging case today. On the other hand, there are many other users who have reported normal experiences with the case and its advertised 24 hours of battery life. Apple hasn't commented on any of the reports.

Back in November, a report from Japanese site Mac Otakara suggested Apple would add a sixth "Jet White" color option to its iPhone 7 lineup, and while no Jet White iPhone has surfaced as of yet, a video making the rounds tonight hints at what a Jet White iPhone might look like if Apple does indeed release such a device.

The video, shared by Sonny Dickson, appears to depict an iPhone 7 and an iPhone 7 Plus, both with white casings. While the iPhone 7 Plus features an Apple logo, the iPhone 7 model does not, suggesting it is very likely fake.

Similar iPhone 7 and 7 Plus casing replacements can be found on various auction sites like Alibaba, so it seems the iPhones in the video are sporting third-party shells rather than representing actual forthcoming iPhone models.

Mac Otakara did not indicate when Apple might release its white iPhone 7, and suggested the information, obtained from supply chain sources, could be "unreliable," so it continues to be unclear if and when we will see actual "Jet White" iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models.

Apple's product lineup has expanded over the past couple of years with the addition of the Apple Watch, a third notebook line, and most recently AirPods, and while 2016 turned out to be a bit of a disappointment for some with the Mac in particular seeing many models go the entire year without an update, there were still a number of significant updates.

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Apple's iPhone and iPad were the most popular mobile devices gifted during the holidays this year, according to new data shared by Yahoo-owned mobile analytics firm Flurry.

Flurry examined device activations by manufacturer between 12/19 and 12/25, finding Apple devices to be twice as popular as Samsung devices.

44 percent of all new phone activations were Apple iPhones, while Samsung smartphones accounted for 21 percent of activations. Huawei, LG, Amazon, Oppo, Xiaomi, and Motorola trailed behind with between two and three percent of activations each.

While Samsung is slowly growing in popularity throughout the holiday season, up 1% from last year, Apple devices continue to be the gift to give. Holding the third and fourth positions for activations are Huawei and LG; which is remarkable, as both manufacturers do not have an individual device within the top 35 devices activated. Their high rank is likely due to the fact that they have wide variety of devices and affordable options (hundreds of phablet and medium phones) for consumers to choose from.

Google's Pixel smartphone, which came out in October, did not make Flurry's list.

Last year, Flurry released a similar report, and Apple devices made up 49.1 percent of all device activations, while Samsung devices came in at 19.8 percent.

Phablets, or smartphones and tablets ranging in size from 5 inches to 6.9 inches, continued to grow in popularity. In 2016, the phablets category, which includes the 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus, 6s Plus, and 7 Plus, was responsible for 37 percent of total device activations. Medium-sized phones, like the 4.7-inch iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, and iPhone 7, were responsible for 45 percent of all activations. Activations of full-sized tablets, like the iPad, have continued to wane.

To gather its data, Flurry measured smart device activations and app downloads from the hundreds of thousands of apps it tracks from December 19 to December 25.

Apple may introduce a new 5-inch iPhone model that sports a unique vertical dual-camera system that sits alongside the existing 4.7- and 5.5-inch models, according to Japanese blog Mac Okatara. The 5-inch model would act as the medium size in the 2017 lineup.

The report, which comes from a Taiwanese supplier, says that the new models, dubbed the iPhone 7s, would be an updated version of the iPhone 7. The new 5-inch model, however, would rearrange the iPhone 7 Plus' dual camera into a vertical alignment rather than a horizontal one.

Earlier this month, Mac Okatara reported that the iPhone 7s and 7s Plus would retain the aluminum design of the iPhone 7. However, the report said the new phones would come in an all-new red color. Multiple reports have stated that there will be three new iPhone models in 2017, including updated 4.7- and 5.5-inch models with LCD screens and a premium model with an OLED display and glass casing.

The new report corroborates an earlier Nikkei report that said a new 5-inch iPhone would arrive in 2017. However, Nikkei reports that the three iPhone models in 2017 will have new glass-backed designs. In November, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said it's likely the 2017 iPhones will switch to new glass casings to support wireless charging.

While Mac Okatara was the first to report that Apple would replace the headphone jack in the iPhone 7 and debut a new gloss black color, its track record is not perfect. In November, it reported the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus would get a new "Jet White" color that has not yet materialized.

Just after the Christmas shopping period, B&H Photo is offering impressive deals on the new 15-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar. B&H is offering $200 off with a free copy of Parallels 12, which is worth $79.95.

2.6 GHz 15-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar - $2,199, down from $2,399 ($200 off)
2.7 GHz 15-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar - $2,599, down from $2,799 ($200 off)

B&H is also offering non-Touch Bar 13-inch MacBook Pros for $100 to $150 off. Those who purchase those models will also receive a free copy of Parallels 12.

MacRumors is an affiliate partner with B&H Photo Video and may sometimes get paid if you click one of the above links and purchase a product or service.