Sources: Apple has started early production of new iPhone models with Force Touch, volume manufacturing scheduled to ramp up as soon as next month
Apple Suppliers Start Making iPhones With Force Touch — Apple Inc. has started early production of new iPhone models with a feature called Force Touch …
Context & Ripple Effects
This closes the loop on a rumor arc that began in March, when sources said the pressure-sensing technology from the Apple Watch would migrate to the next iPhones (Force Touch coming to the iPhone line). Bloomberg now reports early production is underway at suppliers, with volume manufacturing ramping as soon as next month — the mechanical confirmation that the feature made the cut.
The timing matters because it precedes the scale decision: weeks later, sources reported Apple ordering 85M–90M units, roughly 10 million more than the prior year's initial build. By September the feature had a consumer-facing name — '3D Touch,' described as a three-level evolution of Force Touch on the iPhone 6s.
First-order effects
- Apple's suppliers shift immediately into ramp mode, converting pilot lines for the new models into volume production a full quarter-plus ahead of the fall launch window.
- Force Touch graduates from a single-device feature on the Watch to a flagship iPhone differentiator, giving Apple's marketing a hardware story no Android rival had shipped at scale.
Second-order effects
- An initial build 10M units larger than the previous year pushes inventory risk down the chain: suppliers carry the capacity bet, and any demand miss lands as component write-downs rather than an Apple shortfall.
- Competing handset makers face pressure to field their own pressure-sensitive displays in the same cycle, compressing their component roadmaps around a feature Apple normalized.
Third-order effects
- The playbook — prove a sensor on the Watch, port it to the iPhone, then front-load an oversized first order — became Apple's recurring launch structure, visible again when suppliers prepared 75M-unit component runs for later models (the same supplier-prep pattern in 2019).
- It also entrenched the annual rhythm in which Apple's order book effectively sets global display and touch-module capacity, making its single sourcing cycle a structural constraint for the whole component industry.
The trend: Apple's iPhone launches increasingly run on a repeatable supply-chain script — Watch-proven features ported to the phone, early production confirmed by leaks, then an inflated initial order that forces the component ecosystem to bet on Apple's demand curve.