Toni Hobrecht
Back in early January, we heard that Apple reportedly plans to discontinue the iPhone SE line. Now, less than two months later, the same source has changed their mind. Accordingly, new information speaks for a revival. We are talking about the well-known Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
Kuo came back with a report stating that the next iPhone SE will be based on the iPhone 14 body with the same 6.1-inch OLED display. With that, Apple would bring an iPhone SE with an OLED display instead of an LCD panel for the first time. The Chinese supplier BOE could deliver the panels.
In addition, the iPhone SE 2024 will be the first Apple smartphone with a self-developed 5G baseband chip. This new modem should come in a 4Nm process and will only support Sub6 5G and not mmWave. Therefore, the next iPhone SE will serve as a guinea pig for this chip. If any major problems arise, they “only” affect the cheapest of all iPhones and not the more expensive and significantly more profitable Pro models.
Whether the iPhone 16 series will adopt Apple’s own 5G chip in 2024 remains to be seen. At the moment, the main technical obstacles to overcome are mmWave and satellite communications. The modem must support both technologies in order to make it into the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max / Ultra.
Production for the next iPhone SE is scheduled to start in the first half of 2024. With the ongoing shift away from Qualcomm modems, Qualcomm’s Apple business is expected to decline “significantly” over the next two to three years.
