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According to a new report, Apple is adding more suppliers for 5G components as the company ramps up production of the iPhone 13. According to the report, Apple is now apparently working with five different suppliers for antenna-in-package components.
Apple needs to expand its supplier list because it will use more 5G parts this time than last year – the reported DigiTimes. The iPhone 12 was the first iPhone to support 5G speeds, both sub-6GHz and mmWave. mmWave enables super-fast multi-gigabit speeds, but is only available in select areas. Sub-6GHz coverage, on the other hand, is much more widespread, delivering speeds about 2-5x faster than 4G. Still, mmWave 5G is more impressive. But support for it is limited to the United States on the iPhone 12 models.
iPhone 13: mmWave support in several regions
One of the reasons Apple decided to do this was because carrier coverage for 5G mmWave was used sensibly in the US last year, but not so much overseas. Another problem is production costs and complexity. Digitimes says that each mmWave iPhone requires four antenna-in-package models, so Apple has to find additional supply capacity for these parts. Be that as it may, that is set to change with the next iPhone generation. DigiTimes also believes that the iPhone 13 will offer mmWave support in several regions. However, it is not known which countries will be included. (Photo by helenshi / Bigstockphoto)
