The new iPhone 14 smartphones are on display at an Apple Store at The Grove in Los Angeles, Friday, Sept. 16, 2022. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
On March 1, Apple will start charging an extra $20 for battery replacements on out-of-warranty iPhones, according to an update on the AppleCare+ webpage.
The new price will be $99 for the iPhone 14, and while these models are currently under warranty, they won't be after the one-year anniversary of their release in September 2023.
At that point, the higher price point could encourage customers with broken batteries to simply buy a new phone rather than shell out nearly $100 for a replacement part.
Apple has adjusted prices multiple times in recent years, as supply chain issues have raised production costs. Just last month, labor unrest at an iPhone supplier in China led to a production shortfall. The company struggled with similar disruptions throughout the pandemic.
There is also a history of consumers pushing back against Apple's practices around batteries. The company in 2020 was forced to pay $113 million in fines to settle consumer fraud lawsuits around a controversy known as "batterygate," in which iPhone users discovered that Apple installed new software that made devices with older batteries operate slower.
In addition, CEO Tim Cook in 2019 wrote in a letter to investors that "some customers taking advantage of significantly reduced pricing for iPhone battery replacements" was partly behind a lower-than-expected iPhone sales.
General Motors rolled out the newest addition to its EV fleet with the all-electric Silverado pickup truck. Deborah Wahl, chief marketing officer at GM, joined Cheddar to talk about the latest EV offering and how it matches up to its past gas-powered versions. She said she expects demand to soar after the "first-level truck" sold out in just 12 minutes and talked about steps GM plans to take to regain its title as top U.S. auto seller after being dethroned by Toyota in 2021 with emphasis on the EV market. "I think this is an exciting new inflection point for the market overall, for [an] idea of an all-electric future, and certainly shows that we're extremely committed to the idea of everybody in an electric vehicle," said Wahl.
With the annual CES convention underway amid COVID, HP unveiled rolled out a number of new products virtually this year, including new gaming PCs and 4K display monitors. But as industries look toward a greener future, HP is working with the climate crisis in mind. James McCall, chief sustainability officer at HP, joined Cheddar's Kristen Scholer to discuss the company's climate goals, which includes reducing its carbon footprint to net-zero by 2040. He admitted that reaching the ambitious goal will be difficult because much of the company's emissions totals come from third parties. "A large part of our footprint is outside of HP's direct control. A lot of it comes either from our incoming supply chain, the materials, our manufacturing process, or about 30 to 40 percent of it comes from our consumer-use base," McCall told Cheddar.
Martin Fischer, president of technology supplier for cars and commercial vehicles ZF North America, joined Cheddar to discuss the company's solutions for next-generation mobility in autonomous vehicles and its plans to usher in the next phase of electric vehicles. He also talked about the rising demand for self-driving technology on a global scale. "Whereas we are really active also there for passenger cars and commercial vehicles, what we showcase at CES now virtually is our autonomous shuttles," he said. "So, what that means is we bring these vehicles to busy city centers and can take traffic levels down."
Steve Patton, EY Americas Mobility Sector Leader, joins Cheddar News to discuss what can be done to speed up the adoption of EVs, and how infrastructure can be scaled up to support this transition.
Pfizer and BioNTech are working to develop an mRNA-based shingles vaccine following the success of the COVID-19 shot. This latest collaboration will mark the third time the pharmaceutical companies have worked together on a vaccine.
SGH, formerly known as Smart Global Holdings, reported Q1 earnings after the bell on Tuesday. The holdings company reported solid net sales, up a whopping 60 percent from the same period last year, marking its seventh consecutive quarter of year-over-year revenue growth. SGH also announced a two-for-one share split in the form of a share dividend of one ordinary share for every one ordinary share owned. Mark Adams, CEO, SGH and Former President, Micron, joined Wake Up with Cheddar to discuss.
LG announced its latest cooking appliances including its ThinQ Recipe service. The app allows people to choose from up to 10,000 recipes and have the ingredients delivered to their doorstep. LG Electronics executive Brandt Varner joins Cheddar News to talk about the products.
