Spring cleaning continues at Apple. Per Mark Gurman at Bloomberg, Apple no longer plans to design and produce its own displays for the Apple Watch. Apple has reportedly been investigating moving from OLED to custom microLED screens dates since at least 2016.
According to Mark Gurman, the research and development project’s cancelation results in dozens of job cuts within the display division at Apple. However, he adds that the company continues to invest in microLED technology for future products.
So why didn’t things work out? Complexity, Gurman explains:
For all their benefits, microLED screens were difficult to produce in sufficient quantities. Manufacturing them required cutting-edge technology and a complicated process called LED transfers — the placing of pixels in the display. Though Apple owned the design and manufacturing process for the microLED screens, it enlisted a number of partners to handle mass production and tasks like LED transfers.
This marks the second costly R&D project canceled by Apple this year. Apple similarly nixed its ambitious project to develop an autonomous electric vehicle.
Between shipping Apple Vision Pro and ending the car and microLED projects, Apple CEO Tim Cook continues to prepare the way toward his eventual retirement from the company.
In 2021, Cook said he doesn’t expect to be at Apple in 10 years. Now it sounds like microLED products might not materialize until the next CEO takes the company reigns.
In the meantime, head to Bloomberg for the full report.
More
- This is Apple Vision Pro, the mixed reality headset for spatial computing
- Apple cancels Apple Car project after more than a decade
- Apple AirPower is cancelled, Apple says unable to meet its own standards of quality
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