The Wall Street Journal, citing well-informed anonymous sources, reported that Apple wants to increase the production of components for its devices – iPhone and MacBook – outside of China. The company expressed this desire to a number of its contractors.

Sources of The Wall Street Journal say that India and Vietnam are mentioned among the most likely applicants for the expansion of production. The publication notes that Apple’s desire to reduce the production of components in China is caused by strict anti-virus measures, which are introduced by the PRC authorities from time to time, sometimes completely closing entire cities.

Currently, more than 90% of components for the same iPhone, iPad and MacBook are made in China. At the same time, according to analysts cited by The Wall Street Journal, “such a high degree of dependence on one particular country carries potential risks due to the authoritarianism of the communist government in Beijing and its difficult relationship with the United States“.

In April, it became known that about half of Apple’s top 200 suppliers have manufacturing facilities in areas ordered by Chinese authorities to be placed under strict quarantine following a new outbreak of COVID-19. Apple CFO Luca Maestri later said the company could lose between $4 billion and $8 billion in the second quarter due to supply chain disruptions.

According to the WABetaInfo resource, which tracks all the innovations in the messenger, the application developers will stop supporting devices running iOS 10 and iOS 11 this year. This will happen on October 24th.

Thus, in the fall, WhatsApp will stop working on smartphones such as the iPhone 5 and iPhone 5C. This data is confirmed by the WhatsApp Help Center, which indicates that the application requires iOS 12 (and higher) and Android 4.1 (and higher) to work.

Apple is expected to unveil iOS 16 at WWDC 2022 in June. It will introduce many new features, but at the same time, the new OS will not be supported by a number of the company’s popular phones – iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus and first generation iPhone SE.

According to recent data, Xiaomi has already begun production of a new line of smartphones. We are talking about the Xiaomi 12T and 12T Pro models.

The source says that production has started in several countries at once, so the announcement is just around the corner.

Unfortunately, the insider did not add anything about the parameters of the devices. Previously, there was information that Xiaomi 12T Pro will be a copy of Redmi K50S Pro for the global market, and Xiaomi 12T will be a renamed Redmi K50S. By the way, these Redmi models have also not been presented yet, so we don’t really know anything about them. The older one is supposed to get Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1, and the younger one will be based on one of the MediaTek platforms. Quite possibly on the Dimensity 8100.

As for the source, it is the insider Mukul Sharma, who, for example, was the first to talk about Xiaomi Mi Note 10 with a 108-megapixel camera.