China COVID Lockdowns Hamper iPhone Production

Apple has ordered its suppliers to pick up the pace of iPhone development after tough COVID lockdown protocols in China slowed the schedule for at least one of its phones.

As Reuters reported Wednesday (May 25), lockdowns stemming from China’s zero-COVID policy led iPhone assembler Pegatron to suspend operations earlier this year at its plants in Shanghai and Kushan.

Shanghai — one of the world’s financial hubs — has been essentially shut down by a seven-week-old city-wide lockdown, while China’s capital Beijing has recently escalated its quarantine efforts, Reuters said.

Apple said that — in the worst-case scenario — the manufacturing schedule and initial production volumes of new phones will be hindered, according to a Nikkei report.

Learn more: COVID-19 Surge in Vietnam Delays iPhone 13 Delivery

This isn’t the first time COVID has disrupted iPhone production. Last year, the spread of the virus in Vietnam led to delivery delays of the iPhone 13.

In that case, the delay was mainly based on limited supplies of camera modules. The company had been able to set aside many important components for the new phone prior to the rollout, but it also increased the use of its sensor-shift optical image stabilization to all four iPhone 13s models. That component had previously only been used in the iPhone 12 Pro Max.

See also: Tungsten Holds Secret Grip on Smartphone Manufacturers, Connected Economy

And COVID isn’t the only global crisis affecting Big Tech manufacturing. As PYMNTS reported in March, both COVID’s surge in China and the Russia/Ukraine conflict have put the world’s supply of tungsten — an important metal for making semiconductors and electronics — in danger. Most of the world’s tungsten — 83% — comes from China, while 6% to 7% is mined in Russia.

“Right now, if you look at technology metals, tungsten is the most widely used across all technologies,” Lewis Black, CEO of Almonty Industries, told PYMNTS. “It’s a very peculiar metal, making it very difficult to produce, but it’s also in absolutely every part of your life.”