Pegatron

A boost in hiring from one of Apple's key suppliers could be yet another sign of a low-cost iPhone.

Pegatron, which makes the iPhone and iPad, said that it will build up its workforce in China by up to 40 percent during the second half of the year, Reuters reported Thursday. Such a huge increase suggests that the company could be equipping its factories to produce the much-rumored low-cost iPhone, which could launch sometime in the third quarter.

Certain suppliers have already told Reuters that Apple is prepping a less-expensive model of its smartphone geared toward developing markets. Several … Read more

ZHENGZHAO, Henan province, China -- If you want to understand why iPhones are made in this corner of the world, look no further than Li Yue.

When I met the effervescent 21-year-old, she was lined up at a kiosk outside the gates of the massive assembly plant owned by Foxconn. Li, wearing a white T-shirt and blue jean shorts and carrying a pink parasol to beat the heat on a scorcher of a June day, was among a group of a dozen or so candidates applying for a job with the Taiwanese firm. Not a specific job, mind you. Any … Read more

As chatter continues about the possibility of Apple's iPad Mini, Taiwan's Economic Daily News wrote today that much of the device's production is said to be done by the assembler Pegatron rather than Foxconn, suggesting that the device is already in production or just about to be.

Engadget picked up this information, saying the Taiwanese paper reported that Pegatron scored 50 percent to 60 percent of production orders on the iPad Mini. Up until now, Foxconn was the only iPad assembler Apple used. The Economic Daily News also wrote that between the two manufacturers, up to 5 … Read more

iPhone 5 production reports are rolling in from Asia with more frequency. This time, a Taipei-based report claims that Pegatron has started making the next iPhone.

The Taiwan-based manufacturer has begun production of a new version of the iPhone at its factory in Shanghai, according to Digitimes, citing "industry sources in Taiwan."

This follows a week-earlier report claiming basically the same thing -- though that report did not specify the manufacturer.

That earlier report did get specific about the phone itself, however, saying the back of the new iPhone has both glass and aluminum. By comparison, the iPhone … Read more

Ultrabook makers trying to copy the look and feel of the MacBook Air could be headed for some patent trouble.

Among a lengthy list of patents awarded to Apple this week is one dubbed D654,072, which covers "the ornamental design for an electronic device, as shown and described."

Though the phrase "MacBook Air" is nowhere to be found, the drawings accompanying the patent show a thin laptop with a tapered edge, clearly matching the design of Apple's popular "ultrabook."

Blogging site Patently Apple points to the new patent as the sixth one for the MacBook Air … Read more

The Asus Zenbook looks enough like the MacBook Air that Apple is pressuring a contract manufacturer to cease production of the Zenbook, an Asia-based report claims.

Taipei-based Pegatron, an original equipment manufacturer, will not make the Zenbook for Asus due to pressure from Apple, according to a report in the Chinese-language Commercial Times.

Asus did not respond to a request for comment.

The report couches Apple's demand as a choice: either stop making the Zenbook or lose Apple as a customer. Pegatron has been assembling iPhones since last year and would prefer to keep that business, according to the … Read more

Reports that permeated the iPad 3 rumor mill this morning peg iPad 3 manufacturers Foxconn Electronics and Pegatron Technology as having begun iPad 3 production with a March launch on the horizon.

Those reports cited earlier rumors that Sharp was a main manufacturer of the high-density displays used in the iPad 3, which have now been challenged by a new rumor that Sharp did not meet Apple's specifications in its initial run of displays.

The site Patently Apple has published a report found on Korean industry site Electronic Times Internet News that claims Sharp is out of the iPad … Read more

Pegatron Technology, one of the major manufacturers of Apple's iPad, has already begun filling an order of iPad 3 units to be released in March, according to a report from industry Web site Digi Times.

The report also states that Pegatron will be producing between 7 million and 10 million iPad 4 units set to be released in October. And, according the DigiTimes' "sources from the upstream supply chain," Apple will be changing its manufacturing strategy, which will shift the manufacturing load of iPads to Pegatron (with iPhones as an auxiliary product) from Foxconn Electronics, which will … Read more

Apple may see iPhone 4S unit sales as high as 4 million during this initial launch weekend, at least according to one analyst.

Surveying the forecasts of various analysts, Bloomberg found that most are eyeing sales ranging from 2 million to 3 million starting today through Sunday. As one example, Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster is looking for sales of 2 million to 2.5 million, a range that includes all of the preorders to date.

But Yankee Group analyst Carl Howe thinks the number could reach as many as 4 million. Howe told CNET be believes Apple actually made … Read more