Apple’s supplier LG Innotek’s factory is located in South Korea.
New blow for the Apple. While some factories of its main supplier, Foxconn, are gradually reopening, another problem jeopardizes the production of its smartphones. Apple’s photo module supplier for the iPhone, Reuters said, was forced to shut down one of its factories after one of its workers became infected with the coronavirus.
The factory where the employee worked is located in Gumi, South Korea. It was closed over the weekend for disinfection of the premises.
LG Innotek is not the only company in South Korea to have a worker infected with the virus. Samsung Electronics had also detected a sick employee in one of its factories a few days earlier. The Korean company also had to close its factory, causing delays in the production of the Galaxy Fold and Galaxy Z Flip, the two foldable smartphone models.
The temporary closure of the LG Innotek factory will certainly have an impact on Apple since this is where its iPhone photo sensors are manufactured. The factory is however expected to reopen soon. What limit the impact on the production of iPhone. Still, it shows how Apple’s production line could be disrupted, not just in factories in China.
Tim Cook recently made a particularly optimistic speech about the production of Apple products. A speech that is necessarily reassuring for investors after the CEO of Apple admitted that the financial objectives of the first quarter would not be achieved because of the coronavirus.
However, if “China controls the coronavirus”, as Tim Cook said, the epidemic is spreading outside the country, especially in South Korea. In other words, things may not be close to being resolved for Apple.
