There have been reports for a few months that Apple would move away from the glass back of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S to a metal case. What if, however, that case wasn’t aluminum, as in the case of the iPad, but liquid metal, something Apple has a corner on due to an agreeement it penned with Liquidmetal Technologies in late 2010 giving Apple exclusive commercial rights?
That’s what Korean news site ETnews claims. says Apple will use Liquidmetal technology for the next iPhone, which the outlet boldly claims will be unveiled at Apple’s annual worldwide developers conference.
Thus far, Apple has only used Liquidmetal for the SIM ejector tool it includes with some iPhone and iPad models. Liquidmetal is described as a metallic glass formulation.
There has been much speculation over how Apple would expand its use of Liquidmetal. This sort of transition would be a natural one.
On the other hand, the report goes further, and says that Apple will also move its iPhone 5 launch back to a summer unveiling. The report said that the new iPhone 5 will be unveiled at Apple’s annual WorldWide Developers Conference (WWDC), which had generally been the case until 2011, when it was delayed until late in the year.
There have been rumors that Apple would move back to a summer release, but there have also been those thinking it would stick to a full year between releases, to avoid customer anger at a quick update to the iconic smartphone.
Liquidmetal Technologies says that the Liquidmetal pieces that result from its process are stronger, more elastic, and harder than titanium and aluminum alloys, as well as stainless steel. The video embedded below shows a demonstration of their product vs. stainless steel and titanium.