iPhone 6S: A9 May Be Dual Sourced

Peter Clarke, EETimes
9/30/2015 03:15 PM EDT

LONDON—The list of components that make up the iPhone 6S is similar to that of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, according to a teardown of a unit performed by engineering consultants Chipworks.

Bosch Sensortec and InvenSense have retained the places they won for inertial MEMS sensors in the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. In terms of microphones Goertek has retained its place while AAC has lost three slots to Knowles.

Chipworks has said it will do separate teardowns and analyses of the camera and the touch screen systems.

In several areas, most notably the application processor, Chipworks reckons Apple is dual sourcing. So, as expected both Samsung and TSMC are providing versions of the Apple A9. The APL0898 from Samsung with a die size of 96 square millimeters is slightly smaller than the APL1022 from TSMC, which has a die size of 104.5 square millimeters. Both are in the respective foundries FinFET process. In the case of Samsung this is nominally a 14nm FinFET and in the case of TSMC 16nm FinFET.

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