Apple’s little sidegrade will save it billions of Dollars
It’s no secret that Apple is becoming a self-reliant powerhouse as it moves towards a future of almost perfect hardware and software synergy. But aside from the technical improvements these changes, like the company’s recently-debuted C1 cellular modem, will also save Apple billions of Dollars.
A respected and knowledgeable industry insider claims that Apple will have saved around $220 million this year by introducing the C1 modem to the iPhone 16e. Furthermore if the company were to integrate its own modems in all of its phones these savings could reach a whopping two billion Dollars. Add these chips to every device that Apple makes and we’re looking at savings of billions of Dollars annually.
Apple’s move towards replacing almost everything with in-house components on its devices will not only save it money but also make for better products. This is why I’ve been such an ardent supporter of Samsung’s efforts with Exynos despite it having lacked behind Snapdragon chipsets every generation. If Samsung could have an Apple silicon moment then its phones and other devices would improve drastically in my opinion.
Apple is already working on successors to the C1 modem but is unlikely to bring them to the flagship iPhone 17 models this year. The iPhone 16e served as testing grounds for the C1 chip and will help the company make improvements before eventually bringing succeeding chips to future iPhone models.
A respected and knowledgeable industry insider claims that Apple will have saved around $220 million this year by introducing the C1 modem to the iPhone 16e. Furthermore if the company were to integrate its own modems in all of its phones these savings could reach a whopping two billion Dollars. Add these chips to every device that Apple makes and we’re looking at savings of billions of Dollars annually.
This year, Apple is expected to save approximately $220 million on modem costs through the use of its in-house C1 modem in the iPhone 16e. If Apple were to apply its proprietary modem across all iPhone models, the total savings could reach up to $2 billion.
— Jukanlosreve (@Jukanlosreve) April 23, 2025
There are two major reasons why Apple has been trying to make a cellular modem of its own for so many years. Firstly the company wants to be able to control even more of the supply chain and better understand the hardware that goes into its devices. Ever since the Mac and MacBook have switched to Apple silicon they have become formidable competitors to non-Apple alternatives.
Secondly Apple wants to stop paying Qualcomm fees that it deems to be too high. The iPhone has historically used Qualcomm’s modems and Apple has wanted to change that but it kept running into problems when designing replacements. That persistence finally paid off with the C1 cellular modem that made its debut this year inside the iPhone 16e.
The iPhone 16e replaced the previous iPhone SE line. | Video credit — Apple
Apple’s move towards replacing almost everything with in-house components on its devices will not only save it money but also make for better products. This is why I’ve been such an ardent supporter of Samsung’s efforts with Exynos despite it having lacked behind Snapdragon chipsets every generation. If Samsung could have an Apple silicon moment then its phones and other devices would improve drastically in my opinion.
Apple is already working on successors to the C1 modem but is unlikely to bring them to the flagship iPhone 17 models this year. The iPhone 16e served as testing grounds for the C1 chip and will help the company make improvements before eventually bringing succeeding chips to future iPhone models.
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