Apple "to go to Samsung" hidden pain: iPad Mini out of stock

On December 13, the reporter visited Apple Stores in Beijing Sanlitun and Xidan Joy City. The store clerk told reporters that the iPad Mini 16G needs to be booked on the Internet with a personal ID card and has been selected randomly by Apple Inc.

Apple held a new product launch on October 23, and the iPad Mini, which the market is looking forward to, finally unveiled. This is Apple's first expansion of its product category in the past two years, marking Apple's formal entry into the 7-inch tablet market.

“Ipad Mini needs a Yaohao booking when it is listed on the domestic market on December 7th. In the last two days, 32G and 64G have begun to sell in volume, and each person has purchased two units.” Apple Store clerk said to reporters that starting from 10:00 in the morning, There are a lot of people asking about the iPad Mini, and around 10:30 there are already 3 customers who come to purchase the iPad Mini 16G.

In the online shopping channel, iPad Mini is out of stock. Reporters visited Taobao, Tmall and Jingdong Mall and many other online malls found that, although the iPad Mini was already on the shelves, neither the 16GB nor the 32GB or 64GB version of the larger capacity showed "no goods" or "state." The availability of iPad Mini is not optimistic.

Shenzhen Huaqiang North is an important gathering place for domestic aquatic products. According to the introduction of parallel sellers in Shenzhen, the iPad Mini's popularity is far greater than the iPad4 released in the same period, Hong Kong's stores and distributors are out of stock. As of press time, the iPad Mini 16G's parallel imports in Huaqiang North have exceeded 2,840 yuan, which is 400 yuan higher than the domestic official price.

Regardless of weight or experience, iPad Mini is very popular, even more than iPad4, but is currently out of stock.

Industry sources told reporters that Apple's global listing of products is a unique curve: conference - listing date announced - waiting - listing news reports - overnight queue - officially opened for sale - full line of stock - yellow cattle prices, out of stock does not rule out the hungry marketing.

In addition to hunger marketing, Apple has accelerated "going to Samsung" and is one of the reasons for the shortage. Analyst International Analyst Li Yanyan said in an interview with this reporter that the shortage of the iPad Mini was affected by supply restrictions.

It is understood that the iPad Mini is Apple's smallest product with Samsung's electronic components so far. Previously, Apple used Samsung electronic components in chips, memory, Flash, and panels. iPad4 is still using Samsung's panels, and the iPad Mini has no longer relied on Samsung to provide panels and turned to AUO and LG Display.

Li Yanyan told reporters that due to Apple's strict requirements on upstream hardware, the quality and production capacity of Samsung's other hardware manufacturers are all problems, which will affect the supply of the iPad Mini.

Earlier media reports that AU Optronics had planned to produce 2 million iPad Mini displays in the third quarter of this year, but the low yield rate makes AUO only produce 400,000 iPad Mini screens. Due to the low supply of AUO's low productivity, Apple may find a third supplier for the iPad Mini's display panel. AUO has been unable to achieve high productivity for technical reasons. On the other hand, AU Optronics is also solving this problem. The productivity of the panel may become sufficient in the first quarter of next year, and the problem of the iPad Mini's supply will also be alleviated.