Bloomberg reports a research note issued by Yuanta Securities Co. indicates the next-generation iPad might be delayed until June due to “production bottlenecks” at Apple’s manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry Co.
The delay arose after Cupertino, California-based Apple made design changes before the Lunar New Year, according to a report by Vincent Chen and Alison Chen, analysts at Yuanta. Jill Tan, an Apple spokeswoman in Hong Kong, declined to comment on the report.
Our checks suggest new issues are being encountered with the new production and it is taking time to resolve them,” said Chen in the report. “As a number of Android 3.0 tablets are being launched in April and May, the delay in iPad 2 shipments may give the Android camp a brief window of opportunity.
The June timeframe does sound a little strange for Apple, which usually releases a new iteration of the iPhone in late June / first weeks of July, announcing it at the WWDC in the first weeks of June. A new iPad in June would have to face the obvious competition generated by the iPhone itself, although according to this report Apple has no choice because of “production issues”. The design changes also mentioned in the report would have been made three weeks ago, a few days before the Wall Sreet Journal weighed in to confirm a new iPad was in production. The timing of this rumor is somehow interesting in our opinion.
The design changes that are allegedly causing delays could go from new display technology or Retina Display to rear-facing camera adoption and a Light Peak interface for the new iPad. “Design changes” could mean anything, really, and the report doesn’t do much to address more details. We think it’s very unlikely that Apple will push the release of the much anticipated iPad 2 until June, which has become the month for the new iPhone. Another theory is that Apple will release the iPad 2 in late April / first weeks of May and the iPhone 5 in early July, thus putting roughly two months between the availability of each device. This, however, still doesn’t explain why Apple would release another iPad as early as September.
