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Apple Halting Mac Component Orders Due to Overestimated Demand?

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macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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Digitimes reports that Apple has essentially halted all component orders for its Mac product lines, apparently working through significant inventories of components delivered during an aggressive ramp-up late last year that may have proven overly aggressive.
The suppliers originally expected to finish digesting their Mac inventories in April, but are now stranded waiting for further instructions from Apple.

The sources revealed that Apple's Mac orders to the supply chain dropped to almost nothing after the Lunar New Year holidays. Apple had high hopes for its Mac product lines and placed aggressive orders at the end of 2012; however, the company is now badly affected by the decision.
Click to expand...
The report claims that Apple generally provides shipment forecasts to its supply chain partners at the beginning of each quarter, but the company has not done so for the second quarter. The lack of information has reportedly left suppliers wondering when they will be able to resume production.

Just last week, Digitimes claimed that Apple is likely to refresh its notebook lineup at the end of the second quarter, so it seems that suppliers may need to start ramping up production for new models in the relatively near future.

mac_lineup_early2013.jpg

Apple frequently has to juggle its supply chain as it approaches product updates, seeking to accurately estimate consumer demand in order to deplete its existing inventories just as the new models are released. But if today's report is true, it seems that Apple may have overestimated customer demand for the early part of 2013 and is now finding itself with substantial inventories heading into its next round of product updates.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has also warned about reading too much into rumors from Apple's supply chain, noting that its "very complex" nature makes it difficult to accurately interpret what is actually going on from limited data points, even if that data is accurate.

Article Link: Apple Halting Mac Component Orders Due to Overestimated Demand?
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2013/04/18/apple-halting-mac-component-orders-due-to-overestimated-demand/
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T

The Man

macrumors 6502a
Jul 7, 2004
612
225
Beginning to hate supply chain rumors and speculations. Apple has been moving things around, so who knows what they're doing. Macs will also be built in USA this year, who knows if the ramp up was for these components to be shipped to USA.
 
D

downpour

macrumors 6502a
Oct 20, 2009
524
317
A lot of people have been waiting for Haswell and/or cheeper MacBooks with retina displays. So when the next generation comes out demand will be huge. I also imagine there will be a lot of switchers due to Windows 8.
 
L

lukarak

macrumors regular
Jul 29, 2011
180
4
The biggest reason is that there's no real upgrades for people who want to replace their 3-4 year old machines. I'm currently running a 13'' MBP mid 2010, C2D 2.4 GHz, 128 GB SSD, 500 GB HDD, 16 GB of RAM and i can't see a clear upgrade.

MBP 13''? Why? Same screen, a little more processing power and SATA 3 for the SSD.

rMBP 13''? Again, why? Ok, much better screen, a little more processing power, but no 500 GB HDD and no 16 GB, 8 GB is the maximum.

This is fine for now. And will probably be for a few more years because it is not a numbercrunching machine.

And that is hurting Apple, and not just Apple but the whole PC industry. My desktop is a Hackintosh, i7-920, X58 motherboard, 24 GB of ram, all that, aside from RAM is from more than 4 years ago. Again, why upgrade? If it continues to function, I have no reason to upgrade for another 4 years.
 
B

billystlyes

macrumors 6502a
Jul 5, 2004
569
6
The Mac section in two of my local Best Buys has been a ghost town. It use to be really busy, but now people mostly look at tablets, iPads, phones and cheap Windows laptops. The latter is probably a sign of the economy. If Apple would only wake up and adjust their prices. They would capture way more market share. JMHO
 
sw1tcher

sw1tcher

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
5,385
18,401
Oh, great. More negative news to bring the stock price down some more tomorrow... regardless of if the info is accurate or not.
 
Ramchi

Ramchi

macrumors 65816
Dec 13, 2007
1,088
563
India
Not sure if this has anything to do with Windows 8 launch.

Such expensive Notebooks or Workstations will not be easily replaced by users (like Mobile Phones) frequently. iPhone and iPad attracted because of price points. With huge upfront cost and compatibility issues (Office, Productivity tools that are running in Windows platform) may force new customers to think little more before jumping.

The new iMac though is very sleek it lacks expansion options like the previous iterations. Many would still want Disk Drive and Memeory expansion options....
 
sw1tcher

sw1tcher

macrumors 603
Jan 6, 2004
5,385
18,401
downpour said:
A lot of people have been waiting for Haswell and/or cheeper MacBooks with retina displays. So when the next generation comes out demand will be huge. I also imagine there will be a lot of switchers due to Windows 8.
Click to expand...

The biggest issue with Win8 among those complaining is the appearance and feel vs WinXP, Vista, and 7. But that can easily be fixed with a little program like Classic Shell or Start8.

People are not going to switch to an even more different OS from WinXP, Vista, or 7 because Win8 is slightly different than what they're used to. Moving to OS X from a pre-Win8 OS computer would be an even bigger change for them, IMO. And it may also require replacing a bunch of old software and hardware that isn't OS X compatible. That's a lot of $$$ to be spending in this still down economy.

If anything, they'll just stick with what they currently have. And the IDC report from a few days ago seems to support this.
 
M

MacGit

macrumors member
Jul 15, 2008
38
2
Manchester, England
If the rumours are true, I propose 3 reasons for the lull in demand, aside from the World Recession and that "everyone's skint": 1) They are way too expensive; 2) Mountain Lion is more Dog than Cat, and; 3) Quality and build is diabolical.
Let me elaborate on point 3. Every single Apple product I have owned since 2001 has failed in some way or another. Screens and/or displays on ALL (7 in total) iMacs I've had, hard drives on iMac 27 inch, hinges on Powerbook, DVD drives on 4 iMacs, apart from my latest iPhone 5, ALL iPhones from Mark 1 onwards have been replaced by Apple due to faulty builds. Yet my old and horrible-to-use HP Tower from 2004 has had no problems (apart from software/OS) to date. Neither has our 2005 Toshiba Satellite Pro laptop. Jus' sayin'... ;-)
 
M

Mackan

macrumors 65816
Sep 16, 2007
1,421
91
lukarak said:
The biggest reason is that there's no real upgrades for people who want to replace their 3-4 year old machines. I'm currently running a 13'' MBP mid 2010, C2D 2.4 GHz, 128 GB SSD, 500 GB HDD, 16 GB of RAM and i can't see a clear upgrade.

MBP 13''? Why? Same screen, a little more processing power and SATA 3 for the SSD.

rMBP 13''? Again, why? Ok, much better screen, a little more processing power, but no 500 GB HDD and no 16 GB, 8 GB is the maximum.

This is fine for now. And will probably be for a few more years because it is not a numbercrunching machine.

And that is hurting Apple, and not just Apple but the whole PC industry. My desktop is a Hackintosh, i7-920, X58 motherboard, 24 GB of ram, all that, aside from RAM is from more than 4 years ago. Again, why upgrade? If it continues to function, I have no reason to upgrade for another 4 years.
Click to expand...

You forgot that Apple drops support for older hardware very aggressively, even if that hardware is still perfectly fine to run the latest. If you want latest OS X, latest Safari, etc, etc, you'll have to buy new hardware sooner or later. Not because it wouldn't work fine on your current laptop, but just because of Apple's artificial restrictions.
 
haruhiko

haruhiko

macrumors 604
Sep 29, 2009
6,529
5,875
Mackan said:
You forgot that Apple drops support for older hardware very aggressively, even if that hardware is still perfectly fine to run the latest. If you want latest OS X, latest Safari, etc, etc, you'll have to buy new hardware sooner or later. Not because it wouldn't work fine on your current laptop, but just because of Apple's artificial restrictions.

This will be come more apparent the following years, since not even RAM will be upgradeable in the future. And of course, look at the iOS devices.
Click to expand...

Apple is so aggressive in dropping support for older hardware that the 2009 iPhone 3GS can still be upgraded to the most recent version of iOS 6...
 
M

MacGit

macrumors member
Jul 15, 2008
38
2
Manchester, England
Mackan said:
You forgot that Apple drops support for older hardware very aggressively, even if that hardware is still perfectly fine to run the latest. If you want latest OS X, latest Safari, etc, etc, you'll have to buy new hardware sooner or later. Not because it wouldn't work fine on your current laptop, but just because of Apple's artificial restrictions.
Click to expand...

Agreed. One of my frustrations with Apple. For example, they categorically asserted that iCal no longer works with Snow leopard, yet I have since found a simple way of making iCal work with our other iCloud Macs running ML. That is frankly unforgivable behaviour towards loyal punters in my view.
 
the8thark

the8thark

macrumors 601
Apr 18, 2011
4,628
1,735
JayCee842 said:
And who are their sources? Are they even credible? :confused:
Click to expand...

Does not matter who. As most sources have questionable reliability. The trend of the rumours is what we are after. If a lot of independent rumours are saying similar things, then that's a trend we can look into as a possibility for something.

Or it could be just a lot of analysts getting on the hype train. Either way it's interesting and something to watch.
 
G

gregorsamsa

macrumors 6502a
Apr 6, 2006
843
1
(Metamorphosing near) Staffs, 51st State.
billystlyes said:
The Mac section in two of my local Best Buys has been a ghost town. It use to be really busy, but now people mostly look at tablets, iPads, phones and cheap Windows laptops. The latter is probably a sign of the economy. If Apple would only wake up and adjust their prices. They would capture way more market share. JMHO
Click to expand...
Pricing, especially in economically straitened times, is certainly a factor. My local Mac reseller shut down a couple of months ago. Just not enough demand when cheaper solutions abound. :rolleyes:
 
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