Yet another iPhone....

[Jackie Brown]

Apple are also making a mini iPad, but is that not just an ipod touch?

A 7" iPad, can't wait for the press conference when they make it out to be innovative and new.

Did Steve Jobs not once say that there was no market for smaller form factor tablets.

[Wee Woman]

I'm going to go for an iPhone on my next upgrade, just to give it a go.

Oddly though if I go directly to O2 currently, they can't offer me a free iPhone 4S (they are looking £99 for it) but if I go to Phones4U I can get the same phone on the O2 network (same tariff) for free.

I can't figure how O2 are making anything out of that

[Jackie Brown]

People must still be buying them

[mikerob]

Any back to the topic, any specs on this iphone5? I like figures, ram, speed, cores?

I can sell you an amplifier that goes up to 11. It must be better than one that only goes up to 10, after all...

What sort of answer is that? Can we have some figures?

It is a pointless question. Smartphones all use ARM CPUs but these aren't off-the-shelf processors as used in PCs but are essentially custom designed by the phone manufacturer to include the various functions they want to include and the software has a key impact on performance. Faster processor doesn't automatically lead to better performance, it can just mean it is needed because of inefficient software and the battery life sucks. More RAM doesn't mean better, again, it can mean poorly designed software and the manufacturer needs to chuck more hardware at it to make it work properly.

Have you ever used the current Nokia Lumia Windows phones? You need to wait about 5 seconds switching between applications yet it has a similar ARM processor to other smart phones on the market.

Comparing phones on the basis of processors is like comparing amplifiers because one goes up to 10 and the other goes up to 11. You need to actually use them to see how they perform.

I understand you are an Apple fan boy but have you used an Android phone?

Yeah, several. Despite some with bigger screens, IMO they didn't look as good because the pixel density was less. The touch screen motion was a bit more "juddery", less smooth and responsive. Some apps were very similar, but in general, the iPhone apps were better quality and crashed less. The build quality didn't seem quite as good.

fyi I was talking to some one recently who does web stuff to delivery sports information and there is significantly more use of web content by iPhone users than Android users than the percentage market share of those phone types. His conclusion was the iPhone users on average use their smart phones as smart phones while Android users, on average are still using their smart phones mainly as dumb phones.

It certainly isn't the best smart phone out there and as Rooster says, it barely works as a phone!

The user satisfaction for the iPhone must really be poor then...? Err no, the latest JD Power survey is just out and iPhone users are happiest with their phones, then comes HTC, then comes Samsung.

The iPhone works for me and I'm very happy with it but if Android works for you, then great.

[OneMore]

Yeah, it's hard to compare Apple, Samsung and HTC. I mean, HTC and Samsung have a variety of phones, at different price points, and in different shapes and sizes - ignoring the different iterations of the same phone, they have many models. Whereas Apple just have one really. And if you don't mind your phone not being compatible with anything, and don't mind having to use the non-standard power connections, or not being able to transfer anything to any other type of phone, then the iPhone might be the trick for you. Or maybe if someone isn't really that up with technology, and don't mind everything being dumbed down a bit, maybe they should go for the iPhone.

They patented the rectangle with rounded corners too, don't you know. No wonder Apple are a market leader for innovation. Maybe Samsung should patent the square, or their screen size, or something, so that no Apple phones or HTC's could ever have squares anywhere without paying Samsung for them.

I worry that Apple's anti-competitive actions will only result in the consumer losing.

There are Apple fan boys. There are anti-Apple boo boys. Funny how a phone can be so divisive.

[Wee Woman]

They patented the rectangle with rounded corners too, don't you know. No wonder Apple are a market leader for innovation. Maybe Samsung should patent the square, or their screen size, or something, so that no Apple phones or HTC's could ever have squares anywhere without paying Samsung for them.

I found that rounded corner patent thing really bizarre - as others said, thank god Apple didn't invent a car

[mikerob]

You seem to be a bit of an anti-Apple boo boy yourself, OneMore. "Not being compatible with anything", "not being able to transfer anything" "everything dumbed down". Funnily enough for a phone that can't do any of things according to you, it has been really successful.

The "someone isn't really that up with technology" point made me laugh as well. If you have been heavily involved with designing and developing high tech products, you would know that designing a product that is intuitive and easy to use is really, really difficult. Shoving in loads and loads of features and options with scant attention as to how people will use them is easy in comparison. Down the corridor from me at work are more techie geeks, nerds and anoraks than you could shake a stick at and funnily enough, Apple is the technology choice of the majority as there is an appreciation of just how much original engineering goes into the products compared to a "clone/copy" manufacturer.

[mikerob]

They patented the rectangle with rounded corners too, don't you know. No wonder Apple are a market leader for innovation. Maybe Samsung should patent the square, or their screen size, or something, so that no Apple phones or HTC's could ever have squares anywhere without paying Samsung for them.

I found that rounded corner patent thing really bizarre - as others said, thank god Apple didn't invent a car

The US has the concept of "utility patents" that basically means the functionality of the product and "design patents" that don't cover functionality, but what the product looks like. A "design patent" is there to cover blatant copies... like a watch that looks exactly like a Rolex but without saying "Rolex" on it. In the US, it wouldn't infringe a utlity patent (unless they also copied the watch mechanism) but it could infringe a design patent if it basically looked identical.

Samsung basically made virtually identical copies of the Apple icons for various functions on the phone so one of the things the jury found against them was infringing a design patent.

[OneMore]

They patented the rectangle with rounded corners too, don't you know. No wonder Apple are a market leader for innovation. Maybe Samsung should patent the square, or their screen size, or something, so that no Apple phones or HTC's could ever have squares anywhere without paying Samsung for them.

I found that rounded corner patent thing really bizarre - as others said, thank god Apple didn't invent a car

The US has the concept of "utility patents" that basically means the functionality of the product and "design patents" that don't cover functionality, but what the product looks like. A "design patent" is there to cover blatant copies... like a watch that looks exactly like a Rolex but without saying "Rolex" on it. In the US, it wouldn't infringe a utlity patent (unless they also copied the watch mechanism) but it could infringe a design patent if it basically looked identical.

Samsung basically made virtually identical copies of the Apple icons for various functions on the phone so one of the things the jury found against them was infringing a design patent.

...including Samsung having a rectangular device with rounded corners.

Come on mikerob. You can't honestly think what Apple are doing/have done is helpful in breeding innovation. And it's not like Apple are the only ones being ridiculous here, Apple and Samsung and HTC have been at each other's throats for years regarding patents. If the whole lot of them just dropped all that nonsense, and accept that no one company has the market on innovation, and neither are any of them immune from "borrowing" ideas, they could be making our lives better, one innovation at a time...

[mikerob]

...including Samsung having a rectangular device with rounded corners.

Come on mikerob. You can't honestly think what Apple are doing/have done is helpful in breeding innovation. And it's not like Apple are the only ones being ridiculous here, Apple and Samsung and HTC have been at each other's throats for years regarding patents. If the whole lot of them just dropped all that nonsense, and accept that no one company has the market on innovation, and neither are any of them immune from "borrowing" ideas, they could be making our lives better, one innovation at a time...

..read the trial transcript. The "rounded corners" is a line from the Samsung press release following the trial and it fails to mention what the jury actually judged, which was the shape of the icon, the design within the icon, the colour of the icon, the way the icons behaved in the touch screen interface and dozens of other user interface items that Samsung basically copied from Apple.

Samsung could have done the work to come up with a user interface that was innovative and different, but they didn't, they copied. Even Google wrote to them warning them off the designs saying that they weren't differentiated from other products.

If you want an example of someone innovating, then look at Microsoft's new phone software when it is released. They have come up with a very different approach to phone interface design, based around social interactions rather than a pure "app driven" approach. Some people will like it, some people will hate it and it remains to be see how many there will be of each, and they may be too late to market anyway, but unlike Samsung, they are trying to do something different.

[Airfx]

Interesting to see how much of the iPhone is Samsung.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailycha ... lationship

How much of an iPhone is made by Samsung?

APPLE doesn't make the iPhone itself. It neither manufactures the components nor assembles them into a finished product. The components come from a variety of suppliers and the assembly is done by Foxconn, a Taiwanese firm, at its plant in Shenzhen, China. The “teardown” graphic below, based on data from iSuppli, a market-research firm, shows who makes what inside the iPhone, and how much the various bits cost. Samsung turns out to be a particularly important supplier. It provides some of the phone's most important components: the flash memory that holds the phone's apps, music and operating software; the working memory, or DRAM; and the applications processor that makes the whole thing work. Together these account for 26% of the component cost of an iPhone.

This puts Samsung in the somewhat unusual position of supplying a significant proportion of one of its main rival's products, since Samsung also makes smartphones and tablet computers of its own. Apple is one of Samsung's largest customers, and Samsung is one of Apple's biggest suppliers. This is actually part of Samsung's business model: acting as a supplier of components for others gives it the scale to produce its own products more cheaply. For its part, Apple is happy to let other firms handle component production and assembly, because that leaves it free to concentrate on its strengths: designing elegant, easy-to-use combinations of hardware, software and services.

Stranger still, Apple sued Samsung in April over the design of its Galaxy S handset (a smartphone that bears a strong resemblance to an iPhone) and its Galaxy Tab tablet computer (which looks rather like an iPad), claiming that they copied hardware and design features from Apple products. Samsung retaliated by counter-suing. In the latest twist, Apple has just gained injunctions to prevent the sale of Samsung's Galaxy Tab in Europe and Australia. But the two firms' mutually beneficial trading relationship continues.

The second part of the graphic shows that, beyond manufacturing and component charges, the lion's share of the iPhone's $560 price tag goes to Apple, though just how much it spends on software development, R&D, marketing, shipping, packaging and so forth is unclear. But Apple now commands the largest slice of the handset industry's profit share, so its margins are still impressive even when these costs have been taken in account. Apple also became the world's largest supplier of smartphones in the second quarter (see chart), with Samsung in second place. And on August 9th, the same day as its victory over Samsung in the European courts, Apple even briefly surpassed Exxon Mobil to become the world's largest company by market capitalisation. So although Apple does not actually make the iPhone, it certainly makes a lot of money from it.

[mikerob]

Interesting to see how much of the iPhone is Samsung.

... in reality, all consumer electronics brands these days are design houses. They all source components from the same set of suppliers and they all use the same big contract manufacturing plants in Asia to build the products. You'll get some companies that make components and design products but these will be completely different divisions, and no major electronics brand will single source a component from just one supplier.

The innovation comes from the degree of custom design they do, compared to taking a generic off the shelf design from a third party and sticking their brand on it, and the software (although a lot of this can be off-the-shelf as well).

[breakdown]

Maybe I should make a poll to see who actually likes Apple...

[Joe Schmo]

Interesting to see how much of the iPhone is Samsung.

... in reality, all consumer electronics brands these days are design houses. They all source components from the same set of suppliers and they all use the same big contract manufacturing plants in Asia to build the products. You'll get some companies that make components and design products but these will be completely different divisions, and no major electronics brand will single source a component from just one supplier.

The innovation comes from the degree of custom design they do, compared to taking a generic off the shelf design from a third party and sticking their brand on it, and the software (although a lot of this can be off-the-shelf as well).

Don't forget apple designed the a5/6 chip that runs their iPads and iPhones, no other company uses it. It would make no sense for apple to make their own memory as this is mass produced by companies like Samsung. The only reason apple don't make the stuff themselves is no one in America would want to work the number of hours and rate of pay they do in China. Although I think apple still make/assemble their mac pro computers in Cork.

[Shan]

You'd better stick with it then. From most of the reports I've read, Windows 8 looks like a turkey.

I hope not Mike. All the efforts going to get ready for its launch will be for f-ck all if it turns out to be a pile of crap. Of course it's not like previous launches in that not everybody is going to want it but should still be sizable demand. Can't be doing with another Vista.


As for points by others about Innovation: Innovation is not necessarily about creating something new. It can be about taking things which are already available but bringing them together to create ease of use for consumer, offering them a wide range of things in a one stop shop etc. Like Apple did with the Iphone originally. They don't need to replace it with a whole new product/concept yet because there still scope for further improvements and enhancing. Ultimately the consumer will dictate to all the technology based companies what they need from them.....though of course you can take the lead to an extent and influence consumer desire up to a point as well if you have built your brand.

Looking at Apple now who would have thought they'd be where they are now 10-15 years ago. Most commentators at the time thought they were done for. While the PC makers grew complacent and just kept pumping out boxes with increased speed, storage and some other improvements Apple were out looking to see what they could do with the technology available to produce something which would create the type of consumer buzz which is usually reserved for Boy bands from teeny boppers. They set themselves up as dream makers for adults and children alike and caught the others happily looking at their fancy stock prices and EPS thinking it could never end.

What will be next? Who knows but every tech company, except those concentrating on building bottom of the barrel pieces of crap to capture market share in the <$500 market is investing time and other resources in innovation now. It is the only show in town and ultimately the consumer will win because there is still incredible scope in the sector.


One innovation idea which came out of Korea was when Tesco introduced the Virtual Store. They placed these big pictures which mirrored exactly the layout of a store in railway stations and other places and you could simply scan the barcodes beside your selected items which would add it to your online basket with your phone and when complete it will submit your full order which is then delivered to your house. So they combined the already available online shopping model with smartphone technology. It was a real hit because it meant people could do their shopping while waiting for their train home and they would know their items will be delivered soon after they return home. It wouldn't work everywhere but works in Korea and shows the example of taking existing concepts/technology and using innovative thinking to develop a solution.

We will probably see a lot more of this companies coming together to marry their strengths to develop more amazing ideas or products/services. No longer are we as consumers happy to just accept things the way they are. We are harder and harder to impress and any company wanting to make significant money long term needs to get on board and offer things which make us sit up and take notice. Of course that doesn't mean there isn't still some room for the use of influence and mild control to generate a frenzy of interest in an item which is not particularly better than what is already available. But that can be put down to marketing innovation....Either way y'all innovation is the new master directive for the road to success.