Apple Passed Up A Curved-Glass iPhone Design Due To Cost

The Apple vs Samsung trial has brought us a boatload of information during this past week. We’ve seen mainly prototypes, but I find it interesting to know what Apple considered in the past, don’t you?

Anyways, we are now going to take a blast into the past, and view another iPhone prototype that Apple cogitated about. Douglas Satzger, a former Apple designer, claims that Apple had “strong interest in doing two pieces of shaped glass.” You can view in the photo above of what exactly Satzger was talking about. The display rises near the middle, and dips down towards the edges.

Why didn’t they consider this prototype? Satzger explains, via NetworkWorld:

The technology in shaping the glass, the cost relative to shaping the glass at the time, and some of the design features of this specific shape were not liked.

He then goes on to explain why the glass came with a hefty price-tag:

The technology at the time had a lot to do with it. The qualities of the glass at the time had a lot to do with it. These are models — I’m trying to remember a time frame — that were before gorilla glass and before a lot of the other factors.

So, if this was related to cost, wouldn’t this make Jonanthon Ive’s “not about money” statement false? If they strictly threw away this prototype due to the expenses, the money issue must have been a huge factor. How much could some extra curved glass cost? Clearly not enough to take away from extracting the maximum amount of profit.