Apple’s announcements today were anticipated for two big reasons: new products and features but, mostly, because it was the first time Tim Cook conducted a launch as Apple’s CEO. Cook and the rest of Apple’s team presented a “Let’s Talk iPhone” event following the same playbook as Steve Jobs used to do. Even the clothes. Cook was wearing black jeans and a dark shirt.
But it was not iPhone 5 that Apple released today. “It was not something that we expected, because we were expecting iPhone 5,” said Frost & Sullivan industry manager, Samir Sakpal, in an interview with RCR Wireless News. Instead, the company unveiled its iPhone 4S and iOS 5.
The new phone unified CDMA and GSM, runs on the same A5 chip that’s in the iPad, and comes with iOS 5, which will also be available as a free software update for iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS. Highlights would be the battery life, which according to Apple allows 8 hours of 3G talk time or 10 hours of video, and faster download time: Apple touted download speeds of 14.4Mbps versus 7.2 on the iPhone 4, but did not say that the phone will run on 4G networks. The iPhone 4 also has an “AirPlay Mirroring” feature that allows users to project their game onto a big screen.”The iPhone 4S looks the same, with similar industrial design, screen size and user interface but just with a little better innards. Having a faster dual-core processor helping improve battery life, 1080p HD video recording, an 8MP camera and the ability to roam between CDMA and GSM networks may float some people’s boat, but that may not be enough to seduce all Apple lovers to upgrade,” said David McQueen, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media on the iPhone 4S.
The most interesting thing about the iPhone 4S is the Siri, an intelligent assistant that helps people get things done by asking. Basically, you can ask your phone about the weather, time zones, to wake you up or how the NASDAQ is doing, among other questions. It promises a whole new interface with your smartphone.
This new “personal assistant” is based on Apple’s acquisition of Siri. “While similar to other voice recognition apps in the market such as Vlingo, Siri differentiates itself by being baked into the fabric of the OS, and by its use of natural language processing. The demo of the feature certainly gave the announcement event a wow factor it was otherwise lacking, but it feels like another Facetime in that regard – something that makes for good demos, but which few people will actually use in practice,” pointed out Ovum analyst Adam Leach.
Siri seems to be something new, compared to other features announced, such as 8 megapixel camera. “Apple today announced its latest iPhone, the iPhone 4s, which represents an upgrade in terms of internal hardware but an unchanged exterior. The phone will also run the latest version of the iOS software, which will release as an upgrade for existing iPhone owners shortly as well,” said Leach.
Leach believes that the hardware upgrades should improve performance considerably and keep the phone in competitive with the latest Android and Windows Phone devices, but none will blow users away. “This represents a significant upgrade for 3GS owners, but many iPhone 4 owners will be content to stick with what they’ve got until something less incremental comes along, especially as many will not yet be eligible for subsidized upgrades from their carriers,” he pointed out.
Apple suggested very aggressive retail sales pricing in the US: iPhone 4S 16GB for $199, 32GB for $299 and 64GB for $399, through AT&T, Verizon and Sprint. It will be available in 70 countries on 100 carries.
Before presenting the launches, CEO Tim Cook gave an overview about Apple’s performance. CEO said that Apple has now six stores in China and company counts 357 stores in 11 countries. Related to sales, Cook pointed that Apple sold 45 million iPods in the year-ending in June 2011, and said that in the US retail market, one of of every four personal computers sold is a MacBooks.
The CEO also highlighted the importance of the iPoad and pointed out that 16 billion songs were downloaded on iTtunes. Cook highlighted that over 80% of the top hospitals in the US and 92% of the fortune 500 are either testing or deploying iPads, and three out four tablets sold in the US are iPads.
The senior vice president of iOS Software at Apple Inc., Scott Forstall said that iOS is the number 1 mobile operating system with 43% of the market. Apple believes that iOS 5 and iCloud will bring tremendous upgrades to the iPod touch.
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