launching iPad Mini, iPad 4 and Microsoft tablets seems to have crowded the production lines of the touchscreen manufacturers, and this leads to quite big problems for the year 2012. Combining these releases with an explosion of a factory in Japan, the DigiTimes I say that by the end of the year the production of touchscreens will be seriously affected, and companies like Apple or Microsoft will have problems in delivering enough products to cover the demand on the market.
Due to the recent releases of tablets by Apple, Microsoft and Samsung Electronics as well as a recent explosion at a chemical plant in Japan, upstream thin-film type touch screen materials will be in shortage until the end of 2012, according to industry sources. Since the explosion in Japan, downstream vendors have reportedly been competing for the materials, with Samsung in particular putting in twice the amount of orders it normally does. Additionally, the iPad mini, which is expected to reach shipments of 10 million units in the fourth quarter of 2012, also features a touch screen, which is expected to worsen the material shortage, said the sources.
In the case of the Apple company, there are already problems in producing enough iPhone 5 terminals, iPad Mini tablets or iPad 4 tablets, and they do not seem to be resolved soon. At the moment, more and more mobile terminals are being sold, and sales will increase around Black Friday and the winter holidays, but if there are not enough touch screens, then the manufacturers will not have anything to put on the store shelves and the sales will be seriously affected.
