Instead of just selling you a new phone, Apple is now doing in-store screen repairs on broken iPhones… and this is the monster machine doing the repairs.
A picture of the photo popped up on 512 Pixels, along with this helpful explanatory text:
“From what I’ve heard, Apple Stores have been instructed that the iPhone is the “top priority” for the Genius Bar, and this new repair — and crazy machine — surely reflects that. In addition to the program changes, many stores have Geniuses that are dedicated to iPhone repairs for sections of their shifts. In short, Apple is pouring resources in to in-store iPhone repairs.”
“We’re bringing China to the Genius Room,” one employee said.
From the photograph, it looks like Apple Store Geniuses aren’t repairing iPhone screens manually, but using a machine to guarantee a near industrial-level precision in the finish product.
That’s great news, but according to our own Genius Bar sources, early trials of the machine aren’t going particularly well, with some iPhones being broken during the screen replacement surgery so totally that they require a costly replacement, which Apple expects the user to pay for. You only pay $149 if you get lucky.
Still, fingers crossed that the kinks get worked out. This isn’t just a win for customers, who can theoretically get their screen fixed for much less money than it would have cost them before, but this machine is set to save Apple up to $1 billion a year in the cost of replacement devices. That’s a lot of money, even to Apple.
Source: 512 Pixels
John Brownlee is a writer for Fast Company, and a contributing writer here at CoM. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.
