A highly trusted Apple analyst has claimed that the Cupertino firm is testing an Electronic Paper Display (EPD) from a Chinese company called E Ink, with this potentially set to form part of a screen or cover for an eventual foldable device.
That analyst was no less than the well-known supply-chain expert Ming-Chi Kuo, who in a tweet making the claim, said that the “color EPD has the potential to become a mainstream solution for foldable devices’ must-have cover/second screen thanks to its excellent power-saving.”
Apple is testing E Ink's Electronic Paper Display (EPD) for future foldable device's cover screen & tablet-like applications. The color EPD has the potential to become a mainstream solution for foldable devices' must-have cover/second screen thanks to its excellent power-saving.
— 郭明錤 (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo) May 17, 2022
Kuo’s suggestion that the EPD’s power-saving credentials could make it a strong candidate for use as a cover indicates that we could eventually see an iPad with an always-on case. Such an always-on cover would presumably display essential status details such as the time and notifications, although Kuo referred to “tablet-like applications”, without elaborating on that term.
As we reported last week, Apple is said to have been working on its own version of the OLED technology that Samsung uses for its Galaxy Z Fold 3, possibly with a future foldable iPhone in mind.
And last month, Kuo suggested that Apple was “actively testing” a nine-inch foldable device. He claimed that the device was either a foldable iPad or a hybrid iPhone/iPad, but predicted that it wouldn’t be released until 2025 “at the earliest”.
So, despite Kuo having forecast in early 2021 that an eight-inch foldable iPhone could debut as soon as 2023, it looks like we’ve probably still got a few years to wait until an Apple foldable actually turns up. You can forget, then, any notion of this year’s iPhone 14 incorporating such technology.
