Nikkei Asia reports that Apple has been scrambling to solve a glass cloth shortage, with the supply crunch projected to last until at least the second half of 2027. Here’s what that means.
’One of the biggest bottlenecks for 2026’
According to Nikkei Asia, Apple was one of the first companies to turn to glass cloth fiber as part of the substrate to iPhone chips, partly due to its “dimensional stability, rigidity and ability to facilitate high-speed data transmission”.
As Nikkei Asia explains it:
Glass cloth is a critical component in chip substrates and printed circuit boards (PCBs), themselves the building blocks of electronic devices, and the most advanced types of this cloth are made almost exclusively by one Japanese company: Nitto Boseki, or Nittobo for short.
The problem is that, thanks to the AI boom, companies such as Nvidia, Google, and Amazon have also been turning to high-end glass cloth as part of the substrate for their AI chips, creating a supply crunch much like the memory chip shortage that has driven prices up in recent weeks.
That pressure has reportedly prompted Apple, AMD, and Nvidia to dispatch staff to Japan in an effort to secure supplies, an initiative that ultimately went nowhere. As one source told Nikkei Asia, “No additional capacity is no additional capacity, even if you pressure Nittobo.”
In an attempt to address the situation, in addition to reaching out to the Japanese government, Nikkei Asia says that Apple has also been turning to alternative sources. However, bringing new suppliers up to spec remains a challenge:
Apple is also working hard to cultivate alternative sources, including sending employees to a small Chinese glass fiber maker known as Grace Fabric Technology (GFT) and asking [Mitsubishi Gas Chemical] to help oversee the Chinese material supplier’s quality improvement, two sources familiar with the matter said.
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