Michal Marek According to newspaper reports The Wall Street Journal cost behind the lack of Apple Watch, a problem with the production of the Taptic Engine component. After the start of mass production in February of this year, according to the WSJ, it was found that some Taptic Engines produced in the workshops of AAC Technologies Holdings show low reliability. In short, the component used in the watch often broke during testing.
The second supplier of Taptic Engine is the Japanese company Nidec Corp. and she did not have any problems. So almost all production was temporarily moved exclusively to Japan. However, it will take longer for Nidec to increase its production volume.
However, some watches with a faulty Taptic Engine seem to have reached customers. Experience with broken notification tap depicted and the well-known blogger John Gruber, whose test model of the watch he drew attention to very weakly at first, and not at all the next day. In response, Apple supplied him with a new watch the very next day.
One of the readers of his blog had the same experience, who had his defective Apple Watch Sport exchanged for a new one at the Apple Store. But these are probably isolated cases and Apple is not planning any general intervention. Also the WSJ, for that matter later specified in its report that the defective pieces probably did not reach the customers at all. If so, it would seem to be a really small amount.
The Taptic Engine is a device that Apple developed so that the Apple Watch can alert you to incoming notifications in a pleasant and discreet way. This is a motor, inside of which a special miniature pendulum is moved, which creates the impression as if someone is gently tapping your wrist. The Taptic Engine also plays a role if you send your own heartbeat to another Apple Watch user.
According to the WSJ, Apple has told some of its suppliers to slow production until June. The company representatives did not provide an explanation. Of course, the suppliers were taken aback, since Apple's tent had been saying until then that Apple Watch deliveries were unsatisfactory.
The Apple Watch is currently in severe shortage and cannot be found. You can't buy the watch in brick-and-mortar Apple stores, and delivery times for online orders were pushed back to June almost immediately after the start of orders. Tim Cook at the conference within publication of quarterly results expressed that the company hopes to expand sales of watches to other countries by the end of June.
