Massachusetts Is The Home To Apple's Second Sapphire Glass Plant
June 19, 2014
Mesa, Arizona isn’t the only place in the United States where Apple has a sapphire glass plant. A new regulatory filing shows that Apple partner GT Advanced Technologies has opened a secondary location in Salem, Massachusetts, according to Seeking Alpha.
The new plant measures 50,000 square feet and appears “to be on track and ready to deliver the goods to Apple.” The facility may add up to 20 million sapphire screens “on top of GT's annual capacity of 200 million plus annual units grown from inside the Mesa, AZ sapphire plant."
Sapphire glass is expected to replace Corning’s Gorilla Glass as the material used on some next-generation iOS devices.
Earlier this week, Seeking Alpha said that Apple has amassed enough sapphire glass for three long-rumored upcoming products: the 4.7-inch “iPhone 6,” its 5.5-inch iPhone 6, and the so-called “iWatch.”
Soon after, Economic Daily said the material wouldn’t be used on the 4.7-inch iPhone model — at least not this year.
To date, sapphire glass has only made an appearance on the iPhone 5s handset’s home button. The “unscratchable” material is also used to protect the built-in cameras which appear on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. Besides the iPhone 6 and iWatch, the material is likely to be an important component on the next iPad Air.
See also: Samsung Could Copy Apple Again By Releasing Devices With Sapphire Glass, Apple Begins Shipping Sapphire Glass For The iPhone 6 To China, and Cases Of iPhone Theft In Some Cities Have Dropped Thanks To Apple's 'Kill Switch.'
Photo: iOS device concepts by 9to5Mac