Yeah, this rounded metallic chassis was in a lot of older iPhones. I think they might use their old inventory to produce these budget phones.

It’s the same chassis design as the previous SE, which was the same as the 8. They are probably not using older inventory but likely using existing tooling and processes, which likely saves a significant amount of money. If Foxconn/Pegatron/Wistron doesn’t have to retrain people and/or build new tools, they can do the work for cheaper.