Documents between Apple and U.S. Foreign Trade Zone officials show the company is planning an “aggressive” push to open its new Arizona sapphire manufacturing plant in February, possibly in time to include sapphire in products to launch later this year.
In one of the documents obtained by 9to5Mac, Apple explains that the manufacturing process in the plant “will create a critical new sub-component of Apple products.” Though the ambiguous description could conceivably refer to the use of Touch ID in new devices, it’s also possible that sapphire could play a larger role in existing Apple products; an Apple patent application published today shows a “sapphire window,” with an illustration of an iPhone with a sapphire display. Another possibility is that sapphire could be used in Apple’s rumored iWatch.
[via Apple Insider]
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