Apple invests $ 390 million in components manufacturer TrueDepth Finisar

Apple announced a substantial investment in Finisar. Apple gives Finisar $ 390 million to build a new 700,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Sherman, Texas. Finisar will hire 500 people to work on the laser sensor of the TrueDepth camera from the iPhone X.

Today 's investment is part of Apple' s commitment to investing $ 1 billion in US companies with its Advanced Manufacturing Fund.

Apple says Finisar will work on both research and development and large-scale production of optical communication components. The most complicated components are the vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSEL) used in the iPhone X for face recognition, animoji, portrait mode and others face mapping technologies. But Finisar is also working on proximity sensors, including AirPods.

And it's pretty easy to understand why Apple is investing in Finisar. There are simply not enough suppliers in this field today. In the fourth quarter of 2017 alone, the company will buy 10 times more VCSEL wafers than VCSEL production worldwide during the fourth quarter of 2016. Apple must therefore stimulate production.

The new facility is expected to be operational in the second half of 2018.