Do Apple know exactly what they are doing with the Apple iPhone 4S?
The hotly anticipated iPhone 5 has not arrived; instead Apple has given us the iPhone 4S along with a message from the new CEO of Apple Tim Cook, that despite looking exactly the same as the some-what flawed iPhone 4, the iPhone 4S is all new and very special.
It is of course up to the consumers to let him know whether it is new and special enough; and a five pence share drop in the price of Apple shares on the day of the iPhone 4S launch is perhaps not the most encouraging of market indicators.
There has also been quite a furore across internet forums surrounding the iPhone 4S, mainly showing disappointment in the lack of redesign (against the backdrop of speculation and rumours circulating that the iPhone would more closely resemble the iPad 2 than all its iPhone predecessors and its rivals in the smartphone market; but perhaps it is more of a case of, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. Oh but do fix that annoying aerial problem; I sincerely hope they have. And the iPhone 4 is still a pretty nifty, beautiful, design classic and long should the lack of plastic in mobile phones reign.
But as poet Brendan Behan told, fifty years before Apple become the market leader in Smartphone technology: “There is no such thing as bad publicity, except your own obituary”. It remains to be seen whether this becomes the iPhone’s obituary. The iPhone 4S however will not be released across the UK until the 14th of October 2011; and the consumers and iPhone enthusiasts have not had their say. Upon its release UK residents will get a chance to win an iPhone 4S from Best Mobile Contracts. However, the key message emanating from Apple Central is that it’s what is on the inside that counts, and the iPhone packs one hell of a powerful punch in the smartphone market.
Many consumers are suggesting they will wait for the iPhone 5 to hit the market; however the much enhanced specifications including an 8 mega pixel camera with a customised lens and high performance flash; twice the 2 times the processing power of the iPhone 4 and 7 times the video processing speed;
The enhanced internal specifications of the iPhone 4S are also enough to sway many potential customers at the end of their HTC contracts with the current contract provider and there may well be a whole host of people willing to make the leap from the iPhone 3G to the iPhone 4S.
In response to my initial question, Do Apple, and indeed their new CEO, know what they are doing in releasing something so similar to their predecessor at a time when smartphone innovation is moving forward at such an incredible pace; however the huge amount of media interest, hype of furore can only help to market the iPhone 4S and make it a key talking point and word of mouth marketing exercise. I also have a good feeling that Apple do know what they are doing; unless Steve Jobs was the brains behind Apple.
I know my iPhone 4 is somewhat flawed; I still love it. I know that the iPhone 4S is not the design revolution we were expecting, but I really, really want one and it’s only because of the recession and my current contract which means I can’t have one; but if I was on a 3G I am not sure I would wait for the iPhone 5. It may be that the iPhone 5 just looks a bit better than its predecessor the iPhone 4S, and given that the iPhone 4S already contains tablet technology that’s not too wild a guess, but that its functionality is not much enhanced. Job done, well
done Tim Cook.
And anyway, people didn’t moan as much when the 3Gs came out, and the fanfare was louder then. It was perhaps the internal media beast of the internet which provided the greatest speculation about the iPhone 4, and gave us the title iPhone 5 and the iPad tablet design.