Some 150 Incipio Technologies Inc. employees huddled in the company’s lunchroom last week to watch Apple Inc. announce its newest iPhone models, taking notes and comparing them to what was already leaked online.
Two hours later, they were off creating cases to fit the longer and slimmer iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.
“Today we had the Super Bowl, the World Series, the Stanley Cup, and the World Cup all at once,” said the Irvine-based company’s founder, Andy Fathollahi, describing the fervor that overtook his staff once Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook wrapped up his two-hour presentation.
The Incipio crew is working against a ticking clock—the coveted mobile devices will be available in stores Sept. 19.
So will tailor-made Incipio cases if Fathollahi has his way.
“No one is leaving the office for the next three, four days,” he said. “Every department, whether it is graphics design, industrial design, marketing, product management, logistics, supply chain, procurement or sales, all the teams are working around the clock right now. Obviously people will go home to sleep, so our offices in other parts of the world, in India, in London, are also helping out.”
The challenge involves a lot of moving parts—the manufacturing equipment overseas is modified at the same time the designs to some 60 to 100 case models are perfected in Irvine.
The iPhones’ profiles didn’t come as a total surprise to Incipio’s design team, Fathollahi said. It varies little from what was posted on various blogs prior to Apple’s presentation.
It also helps that the company has been making cases for thin phones for a while, including for Sony and Samsung models.
“We’ve gotten pretty good at it,” he said.
Incipio’s supply chain has met tight deadlines on prior Apple releases, as well.
“The way we move inventory, using FedEx and air freight … allows us to be very reactive, to respond to the demand, and to scale manufacturing,” Fathollahi said. “We will ship several millions units this quarter.”
Still, he can’t control every piece of the retail puzzle—there are those long lines at Apple stores nationwide that are synonymous to almost every phone launch and usually signal supply shortages.
Fathollahi is optimistic and said he “wouldn’t be surprised if Apple breaks every record that they’ve ever had with these two new phones in terms of delivery, and not just the demand.” Especially since “people aren’t going to buy cases without the phone. You got to have one before you buy the other.”
The phones were not the only thing that roused the Incipio team last Tuesday—Apple also unveiled a sleek smart watch.
Fathollahi sees the watch’s interchangeable band as a potential new revenue stream for Incipio, which had about $200 million in sales last year through big retail chains such as Best Buy, various telecommunication companies’ retail locations, and its own website. It competes with a number of brands, including Anaheim-based Targus Group International Inc.
“There is no end to creativity when it comes to customizing something wearable like that,” he said. “We’ll make different bands for different activities, like running. We may do something wild, like eel skin or shark. [The Apple Watch] will be in stores at the time of launch … early 2015, and we’ll be early 2015.”
Tavik
Incipio employs more than 270 people at its 160,000-square-foot headquarters in Irvine and its offices in Utah, China, India and Europe. It acquired Tavik Industries LLC in 2012 and speakers specialist Braven LC in 2013.
Tavik, which makes products similar to Incipio, is running on a different schedule—its cases will not reach shelves at Apple stores until the end of October.
“Their customers are different and have different expectations,” Fathollahi said. “They have their own designers and creative direction.”
Also in stores toward year’s end are iPhone cases Incipio plans to produce under a licensing deal with fashion designer Kate Spade & Co. in New York. Those will take longer than the fast turn on Incipio’s own brand of cases because “there is an approval process with the design,” he said.
Incipio wasn’t the only Orange County company watching last week for what Apple will dish out.
Olloclip
Designers at Huntington Beach-based olloclip also absorbed the new specs and are “toiling away and coming up with great ideas,” said Patrick O’Neill, owner of the iPhone camera accessory company.
O’Neill expects olloclip lenses—which will be designed to work with the new iPhones’ optical image stabilization technology and faster autofocus—to ship in November.
“We can’t go ‘next up’ on rumors,” he said. “We are dealing with optics, which are more complicated than just a case.”
