Independent phone repairs companies could soon become extinct, small business owners have warned, as tech conglomerates such as Apple and Samsung continue to make it impossible for third parties to fix their devices.

Nicholas Muradian, the founder and director of The Phone Spot, an independent repairs retailer with stores in regional New South Wales, said that repairing mobiles was much easier when he first entered the industry around a decade ago.

“Before Apple, everything was interchangeable. Sure, every phone had its own special part, like different cars. But now, each year, Apple is changing its design on purpose to make it harder for us to fix them,” he said.