Vratislav Holub In this regular column, every day we look at the most interesting news that revolves around the California company Apple. Here we focus exclusively on the main events and selected (interesting) speculations. So if you are interested in current events and want to be informed about the apple world, definitely spend a few minutes on the following paragraphs.
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Pavel Jelic China will soon end as the world's largest factory
If we look at any product in today's world, we are likely to find an iconic label on it Made in China. The vast majority of things on the market are made in this eastern country, which offers a large and, above all, cheap workforce. Even the Apple phones themselves carry a note stating that although they were designed in California, they were assembled by workers in China. So China is undoubtedly the world's largest factory.
Closely associated with Apple is the Taiwanese company Foxconn, which represents the largest partner in the entire apple supply chain. In recent months, we could see a kind of expansion by this company from China to other countries, mainly to India and Vietnam. In addition, board member Young Liu commented on the current situation, according to which China will soon no longer represent the aforementioned largest factory in the world. He then added that in the final it doesn't even matter who replaces her, as the share will be evenly distributed between India, Southeast Asia or America, creating a more complete ecosystem. However, China remains a key location for the entire company and there is no immediate move.
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Liu and Foxconn are likely responding to the trade war between the United States and the People's Republic of China, with which relations have been relatively cold. At the beginning of this week, we also informed you that Foxconn has started the classic seasonal recruitment of employees to help with the production of the expected iPhone 12 phones.
The smartphone market is stagnating, but the iPhone has seen year-on-year growth
Unfortunately, this year we are plagued by the well-known global pandemic of the disease COVID-19. Because of this, students had to move to home teaching, and companies either switched to home offices or were closed. Therefore, it is understandable that people started saving more and stopped spending. Today we received new data from the agency Canalys, which discuss smartphone sales in the United States.
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The smartphone market itself has seen a drop in sales due to the aforementioned pandemic, which is quite understandable. In any case, Apple managed to capture a 10% year-on-year increase in the second quarter of this year. Specifically, 15 million iPhones have been sold, which is a new Apple record that has even beaten the previous bestseller, i.e. last year's iPhone XR. The cheap second-generation iPhone SE should be behind the success. Apple launched it on the market at the best possible time, when people preferred products that offer a lot of music for little money. The SE model alone accounted for one half of the entire smartphone market.
A new challenge is headed to Activity on Watch
The Apple Watch is incredibly popular among users and is one of the best smartwatches ever. The Californian giant perfectly motivates apple lovers to move through the Apple Watch, specifically by closing individual circles. Once in a while, we can also enjoy an additional challenge, which usually comes in connection with a certain event. This time, Apple has prepared another task for us to celebrate national parks, which it has planned for August 30.
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To complete the challenge, we will have to complete a fairly simple task. It will be enough for us if we throw ourselves into exercise and treat ourselves to either hiking, walking or running. The key this time is the distance, which should be at least 1,6 kilometers. Wheelchair users will be able to cover this distance in a wheelchair. But what kind of challenge would it be if we didn't get anything for completing it. As usual, Apple has prepared for us a great badge and four amazing stickers for iMessage and FaceTime.
Apple lost the lawsuit and will have to pay $506 million
PanOptis already shed light on Apple last year. According to the original lawsuit, the Californian giant knowingly infringed seven patents, for which the company is requesting adequate license fees. The court ruled in favor of PanOptis on the matter, as Apple did nothing to refute the company's claims. The Californian giant will have to pay 506 million dollars, i.e. a little over 11 billion crowns, for the aforementioned fees.
Patent infringement applies to all products offering LTE connectivity. But the whole dispute is a little more complicated, because we have not mentioned one key issue so far. PanOptis, which succeeded in its lawsuit, is nothing more than a patent troll. Such companies do practically nothing and only buy certain patents, with the help of which they subsequently make money from richer companies through lawsuits. In addition, the lawsuit was filed in the eastern part of the state of Texas, which, by the way, is a paradise for the aforementioned trolls. For this reason, Apple previously closed all its stores in the given location.
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Whether the Californian giant will actually have to pay royalties due to this lawsuit is unclear at this time. Although the Texas court ruled in favor of PanOptis, it can be expected that Apple will appeal the decision and the whole dispute will continue.
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Benjamin Levicek 