A few years ago, the Apple company licensed a technology that allows it to produce "liquid metal", a rather interesting material that was repeatedly said to be used to create iPhone cases, but this did not materialized.
Instead, the Apple company uses this "liquid metal" to produce those keys that allow opening the SIM drawers to change a SIM card, those from Cupertino are now extending the license to use this material in the respective accessories for the iPhone or iPad.
Apple has licensed the technology from Liquidmetal Technologies, the new agreement allows it to benefit from its use until February 5, 2016, but the license will probably be extended beyond that date, as it is unlikely that Apple will invent any new material .
On June 17, 2015, Liquidmetal Technologies, Inc. (the "Company") and Apple Inc. (“Apple”) entered into a third amendment (the “Third Amendment”) to the Master Transaction Agreement that was originally entered into on August 5, 2010 and amended on June 15, 2012 and May 17, 2014 (the “MTA”) . Under the MTA and its first two amendments in 2012 and 2014, the Company was obliged to contribute to Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC, a special purpose subsidiary of the Company, all intellectual property acquired or developed by the Company from August 5, 2010 through February 5, 2015, and all intellectual property held by Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC was exclusively licensed on a perpetual basis to Apple for the field of use of consumer electronic products under the MTA.
The material called "liquid metal" is used by Apple mainly thanks to its resistance to corrosion, because it is light and malleable, and I am sure that you have managed to bend at least one key for the sim drawers of the iPhone terminals.
That said, "liquid metal" will most likely not be used for iPhone cases, but it remains a primary choice for allowing SIM card swapping.
