The sales decline is placing downward pressure on Apple's overseas suppliers, who have rode the iPhone's coattails to success over the past half-dozen years. **t only does LCD supplier Japan Display reportedly expect to post a nearly $300 million loss for the fiscal year ended March, but Nikkei reports that Apple's slowdown is also sending Taiwanese Suppliers into a downward spiral.
"Suppliers are saying that they are getting fewer orders for the second half of this year compared with the year-ago period," a source said. "The traditional peak season this year will **t be able to compare to the past few years."
The report claims Taiwanese Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), one of Apple's primary chip suppliers, may ship up to 30% fewer chips in the second half of 2016 compared to the year-ago period. The decline is attributed to the iPhone 7's expected lack of in**vative features, saturation of the smartphone market, increased competition, and a global eco**mic slowdown.
A**ther source said that for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the sole supplier for the latest A10 chips used in iPhone 7, its iPhone 6s and iPhone 7 chip shipments for the June to December period will likely shrink to 70%--80% of the level reached in the second half of 2015.
Apple Suppliers Largan Precision, LG Display, Catcher Tech**logy, Foxconn, and Pegatron have and will likely continue to face similar declines in the near term.
Largan Precision, a key high-end camera module supplier for Apple's iPhone, reported its first year-on-year decline in revenue in three years in the last quarter of 2015. The company has suffered a revenue fall for five months in a row since last December.
Adam Lin, chief executive of Largan, attributed the dip to a "significant scale-back of orders from a major customer."