Foxconn plans to build five additional factories in Brazil to produce liquid crystal displays for future Apple products. The plan was announced by the Secretary of Planning and Development for the State of São Paulo, Julio Semeghini, and reported by Brazilian news outlet, Folha. The five factories are in addition to the one already believed to producing iPads and iPhones, and each is reportedly set to employ roughly 1,000 workers. In addition to building Apple products, the factories will also manufacture no...

Apple has reportedly already started production of its next-generation iPad 3 tablet. Bloomberg broke the news on Twitter on Friday afternoon, though it did not immediately provide any further details. The iPad 3 is expected to feature a slightly thicker case, twice the battery life of the current iPad 2 model, and a 1,536 x 2,048-pixel HD display. The most recent rumors have suggested that Apple will release the new tablet in March.UPDATE: Bloomberg flushed out its preliminary report, claiming that the iPa...

We just met with Corning during CES in Las Vegas to check out its new Gorilla Glass 2 panels for smartphones and tablets. The new glass is 20% thinner than before, but just as strong and scratch resistant as the original Gorilla Glass. The thinner build will surely help manufacturers make smaller and lighter smartphones. We stayed to watch a pressure test, images of which are in the gallery below, and were impressed with the strength of the glass. Corning said that it’s already shipping the new panels t...

Apple may currently be prepping a huge display upgrade for its MacBook Pro line of notebook computers that would be on par with the bump from its iPhone 3GS display to the Retina Display on the iPhone 4. Citing sources from within Apple’s component supplier chain, DigiTimes on Wednesday reported that Apple will add new display panels to its MacBook Pro laptops in 2012 that pack a resolution of 2,880 x 1,800 pixels. The new displays would quadruple the resolution of the current 1,440 x 900-pixel screen ...

LG officially announced the Optimus LTE on Tuesday. The phone will make its debut in South Korea and offers a large 4.5-inch display with a “True HD IPS Display” that has an incredibly sharp 1280 x 720-pixel resolution. It is also loaded with 20GB of storage, a dual-core processor clocked at 1.5GHz, 1GB of RAM, an 8-megapixel camera, a front-facing 1.3-megapixel camera for video chat and a 1,830 mAh battery. The Optimus LTE runs Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) and is available in black. “Our goal ...

Apple and other manufacturers may introduce new products with curved touchscreen displays next year, DigiTimes reported on Monday. Apple has reportedly contacted its iPad and iPhone glass suppliers, Lens Technology, G-Tech and Fuji Crystal, and will supply them with equipment for polishing glass. Curved glass displays are not typically used on smartphones, although Google and Samsung did equip the Nexus S with a concave screen and it was noticeably more comfortable during phone calls. The curves also protect ...

A defect found in some iPhone 5 display panels may result in short supply next month, suggesting that Apple’s iPhone launch may once again be marred by angry customers unable to get their hands on Apple’s latest and greatest. DigiTimes reported on Friday that Apple display supplier Wintek has identified a defect called a “delayed bubble” in some display panels may affect its ability to meet Apple’s supply demands. Read on for more. (more…)

In early August, we reported that Apple started boosting its iPad 2 display panel orders with Samsung after LG’s panels failed to meet the iPad maker’s quality requirements. DigiTimes said on Friday that LG has addressed the quality issues and has now boosted its shipments back to their original levels. The South Korea-based company reportedly shipped 4 million 9.7-inch iPad 2 panels during the month of August, up from the 2.4-2.5 million it shipped in July, and it is expected to maintain its curr...

The iPhone 5 display will be no larger than 4-inches according to panel suppliers speaking to DigiTimes, which also revealed that Apple will ditch the current glass case on the iPhone 4 for a metal-backed chassis on the next-generation iPhone 5. The iPhone 5 display is expected to be between 3.5 and 3.7 inches and the latest rumor is in line with earlier reports that suggested the phone will be thinner and lighter than the current iPhone 4. The iPhone 5 is also expected to offer an 8-megapixel camera. BGR rec...

Apple will turn to Samsung and Chimei Innolux to supply display panels for its iPad 2 after LG’s panels failed to meet Apple’s quality requirements. The quality issues with LG’s displays forced the company to miss its July monthly shipment goal by 1 million units, DigiTimes said. Reportedly, LG’s LCD backlight units failed during Apple’s drop tests. LG had hoped to ship 4 million LCD units per month during the third quarter, but only shipped an estimated 2.5-2.6 million units in ...

Samsung has reportedly started to build a new high resolution version of its 7-inch Super AMOLED prototype displays. According to the Korean website etnews, Samsung is upping the resolution to 1024 x 768 pixels and will begin production of the new displays “soon.” Additionally, the sequel to the original 7-inch Galaxy Tab could land in North America as soon as this September, when it is largely expected that Apple will take the wraps off of its new iPad and iPhone products. We are definitely excit...

It could very well be that Android’s best hope for a competitive tablet offering in the near term lies in Amazon’s hands. Retrevo Labs, a division of consumer electronics shopping site Retrevo, surveyed more than 1,000 U.S. consumers in June to find out what people are looking for in a tablet. While 50% of those surveyed who intended to purchase a tablet this year said it would be an iPad, Retrevo determined that the most important feature to prospective tablet buyers is a low price point. Consid...

According to research firm DisplaySearch, revenues from touchscreen modules will hit $13.4 billion this year. Projected capacitive screens have seen the largest growth since Apple made them popular on the iPhone in 2007, and DisplaySearch expects capacitive displays to account for 70% of all touchscreen revenues this year. Capacitive display shipments are also expected to jump more than 100% year-over-year. The company said the greatest display growth was in the tablet PC industry, where 26 million touchscree...

Apple could cut Samsung from its list of part suppliers, an arrangement that is worth as much as $5 billion for Samsung, one analyst has suggested. “They have become more competitors and less partners and so I think Apple will definitely not be looking to Samsung as its go-to partner-of-choice for NAND flash,” Brian Marshall, a Gleacher & Co. analyst told The Globe and Mail. Apple could instead choose to get its NAND flash products from other companies, such as Hynix Semiconductor, Micron, and...