According to Bloomberg, the iPhone 13 is suffering from a chip shortage. Apple is reportedly having difficulty getting enough parts to meet its manufacturing goals. Apple originally intended to produce 90 million iPhones by 2021. However, it reportedly reduced that number by 10,000,000 (or about 11 percent) because of supply problems with Broadcom and Texas Instruments chips.
TSMC manufactures the A15 Bionic SoC for the iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Pro. However, many other chip-based components are found inside the phone. iFixits detailed teardown of the iPhone 13 Pros logic boards reveals that Texas Instruments (TSMC) and Broadcom are responsible in large part for key components such as chips that manage display power management, Face IDs laser array and wireless power.
Apple CEO Tim Cook warned that there might be chip supply problems during the Q3 earnings call. He also noted that Apple has good relationships with suppliers and can still not get enough physical components to make enough iPhones.
Apple is likely to eventually get production up. However, the reduced manufacturing estimate will make it even harder to locate an iPhone 13 (already difficult to obtain) in the next months.
