It certainly looks that way.

Five years ago, Apple was a much smaller company in terms of the number of products it develops and ships. Sure there were the varieties of iPods and Macs but that was it. The last existing product lineups that had genuine surprises from Apple were probably the MacBook Air and iPad Nano (replacing the very popular iPod Mini).

Can Apple still spring a surprise of a product that has not been sent to production? Sure, it can show a product/final prototype like the original iPhone or iPad and then announce sales in 60 days. That type of product can still be a surprise. The alleged new Mac product line could be that kind of surprise like the old Apple. An integrated Apple branded TV could be that next kind of surprise, unveiled then launched 60 to 90 days later.

But for the next gen  iPad/iPhone/and even the MacBooks, Apple is shipping in such large quantities that the supply chain/development process has to involve so many moving parts/third party vendors that keeping total secrecy is going to be nigh impossible.

For the iPhone in particular, Apple looks like it’s going to need upwards of 20 million phones a quarter maybe as many as 10 million a month, and cannot logistically pull off shutting down volume of an older version and ramping up production of a new iphone without word of those changes spreading throughout contacts in Taiwan/China. In addition, as the iPhone 4S launch taught us, spare parts are going to leak out prior to the unveiling. The supply chain will have to start sending out various repair parts samples before launch. The repair business for these products has become too big and too important. If there is a big screen iPhone 5 coming next year, our first concrete sign will be replacement back cover or a replacement LCD unit.

For the iPad 3, the production of that many retina display quality LCD panels is not going to go unnoticed. We also can guess based on the recent iPhone 4s launch that Apple is going to keep the iPad 2 in production at a lower price point even after the iPad 3 launches (Apple didn’t do that for the iPad 2 launch, and sales numbers for the original iPad product reflected the ramp down and ramp up problems). Two production lines churning out different iPad versions is going to create some noise, enough that news sites/analysts are going to be able to track down the impact.

Mac volume especially for the MacBook lineup is getting close to that kind of volume. Mac volume if current growth trends continue will be over 5 million a quarter, and already sees the impact of customers delaying purchases waiting for the hardware refresh. For the recent MacBook Air launch, Apple was able to build up inventory before release due to the coordination of launching the MacBook Air with OS X Lion. Again, in these kinds of volumes, the scaling back of production and the ramping up of the new product line is going to create noise.

Apple cannot do the “prototype unveiling/product launches 60 days” with the iPad or iPhone or risk hurting sales for almost 2 quarters due to the demand drop in the quarter right after the announcement and then the inability to meet the pent up demand in the following quarter after launch. That potential problem is only going to increase as the installed base (upgrade base) continues to get larger and larger. The analysts all thought that iPad sales were slowing down in February-March (calendar Q1) when it was more a case of customers waiting on the new product and then not enough iPad 2 inventory to meet that demand in calendar Q2 (April thru June). Apple may in the future have to pre-announce a price drop (letting customers know a new model is coming) and take the hit in margin something it has been reluctant to do especially for the iPhone. But a price drop prior to the announcement and mass availability of the new iPhone 5 could keep sales going of the all iPhone variants with no real dip seen at launch.

Great point already brought up by Paul Miller at this is my next (old Engadget writers soon forming their new site http://www.verge.com ). This mode seems to be a natural addition for both the iPhone and iPad versions of Siri. The old version of Siri had a text input mode, so it would be odd if it’s disappeared with the new version.

Where is Siri for Macs?

This assistant feature looks incredibly powerful, and the natural next question is when does Apple release a Siri application for the Mac where the digital concierge feature could be even more important? Could we have to wait to see Siri for Mac until it’s fully integrated into the next version of OS X? Numerous blogs (Paul Miller again at this is my next ) have linked to this famous Apple video of the potential future of computing from the late 80s. It may now be close at hand.

Does Siri work on iPads?

We were not shown Siri for the iPad. The iPad2 has the A5 processor, so it would seem obvious to that an iPad version of Siri is out there. These kinds of voice commands could really expand the iPad’s use for a lot of customers.

What does Siri look like for education?

Siri looks like the worst nightmare for online education with the ability to grab answers for almost any type of question. But imagine instead a reversed Siri assistant that is providing a learning experience using the web, able to respond to questions and able to check answers. Free form education navigated by the learner.

Where were the announcements about a new Chinese carrier for the iPhone, isn’t Apple making a huge push into China?

Sprint was added as was a new Japanese carrier. This leaves China as the only major market with only one carrier for the iPhone. India has two GSM carriers but there are also two large CDMA Indian carriers expected to get the iPhone at some point.

So let’s review the major Chinese carriers and their cellular networks.

China Mobile – TD-SCDMA network- Chinese proprietary version of CDMA technology. Apple will probably have to build a unique separate version of the iPhone for China Mobile. Right now, unlocked unofficial iPhone customers use China Mobile’s older 2G EDGE network. China Mobile has over 600 million customers so there’s enough of a economic rationale to create a stand alone phone. In addition, China Mobile is planning a proprietary version of LTE, so Apple will have to create a unique 4g iPhone down the road as well. It’s probably early 2012 until Apple will have a China Mobile only iPhone ready.

China Telecom – another carrier using CDMA, but it is very similar to the CDMA standard used by Verizon/Sprint. Rumored to be close to signing a deal with Apple.

China Unicom – GSM network – Current vendor of the iPhone 3gs/4.  130 million customers. 4g LTE plans are unknown at this time.

What does the iPhone lineup tell us about the future of the iPad lineup when the iPad 3 is released?

That Apple, unlike with the original iPad which Apple stopped producing, is more than likely to keep the iPad 2 in production and lower the price. Apple instead won’ t ramp down iPad 2 production, it will now have a lower price offering while ramping up a production line for iPad 3.

It was obvious from the amount of time given to iOS 5 and iCloud at the event that the new iPhone was going to be an upgraded iPhone 4. A newer device with a new form factor would have been given more show time at the event.

Tim Cook’s recap of Apple’s business operations was fine, he seemed at ease presenting the information. MoD wonders if he will be a presence on the earning calls coming up in two weeks. Steve’s absence was to be expected, and MoD doesn’t think it is reflective of any coming bad news related to his health condition. Health permitting something like the launch of the iPad 3/iPhone 5 might be his next Apple public appearance, but he will want to give Cook plenty of room to get established.

The presentations being done by the various EVPs were fine. Phil Schiller was a little over the top trying to drum up excitement for the new features of the iPhone 4S. But that task was kind of a tough sell. Once, it was clear that there was no iPhone 5, the specs on the iPhone 4 s had been well established.

Was this event disappointing? Personally,  Yes. I’m so ready for a bigger screen iPhone, so was the rest of the tech blogger community. For the average consumer who will be artfully walked through the new features by Apple’s marketing juggernaut, no. Something to consider, the iPad 2 event was so-so and featured basically a spec’ed up product, and that device has been selling in record numbers and shows no signs of stopping.

Would tech bloggers be complaining if this had launched in June as expected? If released in June with all the new features of iOS 5, MoD thinks the complaints would be minimal. Apple would have followed their expected timeline. The extra 4 months of waiting on the device raised rumors and expectations to an unrealistic level. In addition, part of the complaint that we are seeing is based on the fear that the iPhone 5 is at least 12 months away. That the iPhone 5 is not going to be released until October 2o12.

Is this a compelling upgrade for iPhone users? There’s a significant number of iPhone users who still have 3g and 3gs phones. This new iPhone 4s is going to a tremendous upgrade. For Verizon and Sprint customers, this is going to be their first new iPhone product, so folks dumping two year old Blackberrys and feature phones are going to think it’s great.

Who is really disappointed in the iPhone 4s release? If you bought a first generation Android phone and were looking to replace it with a big screen iPhone. And that population is going to be mostly the noisy tech elite who write most of the blogs. The top end Android and Win 7 phone devices this fall will have 4 inch screens, so the iPhone with a 3.5 inch screen is seen as a none starter by that population. These are also the same folks who want Apple to add more USB ports to the MacBook Air.

Why did Apple release an updated iPhone 4 and why did it take 16 months to do that? There are any number of potential conspiracy theories here. Here’s the MoD theory. MoD thinks Apple needed to delay the release of iOS 5 to get OS X Lion out the door. Apple does not have the QA resources to launch a desktop OS and mobile OS in the same quarter. This scheduled delay gave Apple time to consider what to do with their next iPhone release. Two avenues were co developed. A spec’ed up iPhone 4. A brand new big screen form factor. Each design would use the same internal stuff; 8 megapixel camera, A5 processor, Qualcomm world phone chipset. During this development window say March to June, Apple continued to receive sales feedback on the iPhone 4 from carriers with no sales slowdown at all. Some time this summer, prototype production runs of the bigger screen thinner iPhone 5 started seeing some quality issue   (a high percentage of a key component were not meeting Apple’s quality benchmarks), Apple’s suppliers were not going to be able to supply enough parts to make a launch viable. Apple had allegedly seen this kind of component quality issue before in trying to scale up iPad 2 production. Apple knew the last thing it needed this holiday season was a lack of iPhone hardware, whatever new iPhone being put into production needed a guarantee of large scale volume to meet unit demand. So, Apple shelved the big screen iPhone for now and focused all energies on the iPhone 4S with a relatively stable supply path.

What is the biggest overlooked elements of the launch? iOS 5 and iCloud. iOS 5 is all but ignored since tech bloggers have been using it since June. However for regular customers, it’s almost like getting a new iPhone it has that many features. And unlike Android’s new OS release Ice Cream Sandwich, it’s going to be available to the entire eligible installed base on October 12th. Airplay mirroring is the biggest hidden feature. It can potentially open a world of applications and games indirectly for the AppleTV. It’s like an SDK for AppleTV without all the work. iCloud is a pure catchup feature, but it’s a big one. A free email/calendar/contacts account from Apple for your iDevices and Macs. Apple rarely does anything for free, so that should tell you how important it is. It strikes at the heart of Google’s best free web apps. It also allows for stand alone iPhones and iPads which is a big improvement as well.

When will the iPhone 5 launch? If the iPad 3 with a retina display launches in February/March as expected, then WWDC 2012 should see the announcement of the new iPhone. Production issues with the new LCDs should be resolved and in addition the multi-protocol chipsets from Qualcomm should be available providing full support for the Verizon and AT&T (maybe Sprint as well) LTE networks. This new product will allow for the following price points;

• iPhone 5 – $199   (16GB) ($630 without contract?)
• iPhone 4S – $99  (16 GB)  ($499 without contract?)
• iPhone 4 – free with contract (16 GB) ($399 without contract?)

And this strategy will allow Apple to keep building iPhone 4S in quantity while also starting production of the iPhone 5. Apple should be able to seamless ramp up a new production line while keeping existing production lines going. And pushing the iPhone 4 further down into more customer price segments. And it should also lead to the next question question/answer.

What about the cheaper pre paid iPhone? It seemed too soon for a cheaper iPhone 4. And it is, but by next summer Apple could have designed an iPhone 4 with only 8 GB of memory with slightly cheaper material cost and gotten that product down to $300/$350 while still maintaining an acceptable margin. Foxconn’s Brazilian factory could be ready in 6 months to begin production of such an iPhone for North America/South America/and Europe.

Is there a risk in pushing off upgrading the form factor of the hardware for possibly another 12 months? Yes. It’s a gamble that Nokia won’t flood the lower end market with big screens well equipped Win 7 Phones over the next 12 months. The next wave of Google Android phones using the new OS could close the gap between iOS and Android. The smartphone market is a fluid and volatile place with little certainty. Just ask RIM who while waiting on their next gen platform may see their US smartphone market share hit single digits.

I was only 9 years old when John Lennon was murdered taken too soon with many more songs to write, so I didn’t really understand the impact of someone dying who you felt like you knew but you really didn’t know at all. I think the first time the death of a celebrity really upset me was the death of Freddie Mercury in 1991. Like John Lennon and Steve Jobs, Freddie was taken from us too soon. Being a huge fan of Queen, it was depressing to know that I would never be able to hear Queen with Freddie live in concert. Queen would never produce another album with Freddie on lead vocals. I was very lucky to be able to come pretty close by seeing Freddie’s best friend Elton John do a phenomenal live performance of “Show Must Go On!” where Elton seemed to be channeling Freddie’s vocal power that night.

I think Steve Jobs would be very happy to hear that he’s being compared to two great rock artists, Lennon and Mercury. Apple Computer as most folks realize was named as an homage to Apple Records the Beatles Recording Label. Ironically this sign of adoration would cause Jobs legal problems when Apple become the digital provider of music, and the Beatles were one of the last artists to be on the iTunes Music Store.

Steve was a true Rock Star in every sense of the term. Brilliant, ahead of this time, visionary, mercurial, polarizing, obsessed with every minute detail. Apple products since Steve returned have had the soul of an artist, an aesthetic balance that other companies have had an impossible time trying to equal. Apple products were almost like albums to Jobs, he’d redo every possible aspect of a product to make sure that it was perfect. You can almost see Jobs in the role as a frontman for a megaband demanding to record a song for the hundredth time to get it just right. His keynote presentations were the equivalent of rock concerts. Jobs would rehearse every element down to the smallest detail. The legendary Jobs reality distortion field was like a rock star mesmerizing an audience. Jobs in many ways was the 5th Beatle, only creating in the world of technology. The Apple 2 was Meet the Beatles. The Mac was a Hard Day’s Night. The iMac was Help. The iPod was Rubber Soul. The iPhone was his White Album. The iPad is Sgt Peppers.

It’s really sad to realize that Steve won’t be there to introduce Apple’s next great product. However, there isn’t a major rock artist today who won’t acknowledge the influence of the Beatles on their craft. And while we will not get to enjoy any new Steve “albums” I’m confident that there’s a future Police or Pearl Jam in Cupertino (please insert your favorite band here, I’m just listing two of mine)  to release the next great product/album. Steve won’t be the frontman on these products but his influence will be obvious. Maybe the iPhone 5 will be “Ten” or the iPad 3 will be “Ghosts in the Machine”, new great albums from new artists.

___________________________________

As a Philosophy/History/French major working in IT, there was no clearer explanation of why I use Apple products than when Steve said;

“It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.”

Photo by Michael Copeland (from Fortune)

In fact, Steve since 2008 years has been working to develop a “college” at Apple, Fortune’s recent article detailing the inside operations of Apple was the first piece to mention the Apple University created recently to codify, document, and institutionalize the Steve way of creating great products. This was Steve’s way of ensuring his DNA got baked into Apple’s future, and ensuring the future of this amazing intersection of technology and the humanities. It’s a college that I would love to attend, but I’ll settle for using their great products.

So there have been 3 distinct rumor threads all spring and summer about the iPhone lineup

1. An upgraded iPhone 4 with an A5 processor and improved camera. This has been called the iPhone 4s, alleged to have the internal codename N94.

2. The Tear Drop iPhone 5. Thinner and lighter but with a 4 inch screen.

3. A low budget/cheaper iPhone for the prepaid market. Based on the iPhone 4 but with some reduced material costs. Would retail unlocked for $300 to $350.

The flurry of activity has provided evidence for all 3 to be possibly announced on Tuesday.

The iPhone 4s is a total lock for some kind of announcement on Tuesday. There have been reports of confirmation in iTunes code, physical parts showing up in repair shops, and inventory listings of the iPhone 4S at retail stores. So MoD places the odds of an upgraded iPhone 4 called the iPhone 4S at 90%.

The iPhone 5 is a trickier creature to confirm. There have been no reports of repair parts or spare parts. Numerous analysts are indicating that they can find no signs of production of such a phone. However, there have been numerous rumors of this device. And in the last week, there’s been confirmation of literally thousands of iPhone 5 cases available throughout China along with a supporting story of a stolen prototype being the source of the dimensions of the cases. The case production at this point represents an investment of at least  $50,000 dollar perhaps more. There’s a lot of confidence behind this case production. To continue with the case evidence, there’s now evidence of iPhone 5 cases with the same design showing up at AT&T stores. There are pretty generic cases but why are they at AT&T stores? An additional rumor shows AT&T’s  inventory system showing Case-Mate iPhone 5 designs. Last rumor is from regional cell phone provider Cincinnati Bell which had a placeholder website for a pay as you go unlocked iPhone 5. The details of the web page include a 4 inch display and 4g speeds (using the HSPA+ standard) for $639.99 which sure seems like the right unlocked price for Apple’s latest and greatest iPhone. In addition, there’s a placeholder for an iPhone 4s for $99 after rebate $300, and the iPhone 4S is listed as having an A5 processor (Apple’s going to be pushing the Voice Assistant feature and indicating the processor requirements). Now it could simply be a website developer piecing together rumors, but the pricing part seems very accurate.

So that’s the pro evidence, which is certainly a smoldering fire if nothing else. Beyond the analyst claims that the phone is not in production,  as a counter you have John Gruber from Daring Fireball indicating that the design seems un-Apple like due to symmetry issues on the top and bottom of the device in terms of screen space  and issues using the device in landscape mode with it being tapered and weighted differently. In addition, the event being on Apple’s campus and not at a bigger venue indicates to Gruber that this is not a huge event. Now MoD can see Gruber’s point on the balance/symmetry of the device, but the venue appears to be more related to scheduling issues than anything else. And in MoD’s opinion, Apple won’t want Tim Cook’s first event as CEO to have any odor of “underwhelm”. MoD thinks Apple is releasing new brand new hardware along with some significant new goodies from iOS 5 (Voice Assistant demo).  The biggest evidence against the iPhone 5 is that no repair store has gotten spare parts for the new device. Our final odds on the brand new iPhone 5 are 75%.

Now to the final rumor, the cheaper iPhone 4 for prepaid plans (huge addressable market in China, India, and the rest of Asia). Now first off this rumor really only has one real source. The recent leak of iPhone 4′s being built in Brazil from Gizmodo. This iPhone has a new product name of N90A (N90 is current iPhone). Now there’s zero evidence of a price point for this iPhone or that N90A means anything different than iPhone 4 built in Brazil. However, why is Foxconn’s new Brazil factory building Apple’s previous model iPhone 4, and if China is an intended market why build it in Brazil at all? So odds of a $300 pre paid cheap iPhone 4 being released, 30%. Apple massive push into China is giving MoD second thoughts about that number, but there’s no other real evidence.

One last thing, all analysts and techbloggers are presuming that LTE is out of the question for this release. Generally speaking they use the quote from Tim Cook at Apple’s 2011 calendar  Q1 earnings conference call  as evidence. In April, Cook stated that the current chipsets forced compromises Apple was unwilling to make. MoD has long maintained that something forced a 4 month delay in launching this product. A new design makes sense, as would waiting for a new chipset that would allow Apple to incorporate CDMA/GSM and LTE into a one world phone design that can be configured for AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon. After finally landing on Verizon, Apple can ill afford to cede the LTE territory to Android and Win 7 phones until the next iPhone refresh. LTE capable device odds are low, but it would explain the device delay, so lets go with 10%.

This time it’s analyst Ming-Chi Kuo stating to MacRumors that the N94 generally thought to be the iPhone 4S  is heading for production and the iO5 is being released to manufacturers for loading onto new devices by the end of this month which projects out to a launch in mid October. In addition, Kuo’s sources indicate nothing related to the redesigned iPhone 5.

There’s also been a bunch of leaks from Sprint lately related to the iPhone 4/5.  The most recent rumor indicated that Sprint sales team was told that they were be selling the iPhone 4 this fall, not the iPhone 5. 

The only real evidence of a redesigned iPhone 5 is the case manufacturers, who were completely accurate on the redesigned iPad 2 before launch.

Along those same lines courtesy of an article from MacRumors and UK website unwire.hk , there’s a leaked image of a screen protector that seems to be based on the specs of the alleged iPhone 5 cases, in addition it has an elongated home button that has been rumored. Here’s the image from unwire.hk. Could be the same rumor source as the cases, and to date no parts of this design have leaked to date. And a plastic screen cover is just as cheap or cheaper to product than a plastic case, so it could again simply be someone trying to get a jump on the market for iPhone 5 accessories. Still this bigger iPhone 5 with new home button navigation could be a compelling design.

And perhaps the strongest sign of confidence from the case world, major case provider/vendor Case-Mate has an updated page featuring several versions of the new iPhone 5 case. Great scoop from BGR to find this page since you cannot navigate to the page (and MoD is not sure the link will still be working later). Case-Mate has language on their page hedging their bets on what the iPhone 5 will really be, but they felt confident enough to put out this design image on their website. And that’s not a case for an updated iPhone 4.

Now, if Apple just releases an updated iPhone 4 this October, it’s going to be the first significant miss by Apple in four years. The smartphone business is moving far too fast for Apple to stick with the same design from last summer. It the updated iPhone 4 had been released in June that might have been acceptable. But the 4 month delay and Apple’s current 12 month refresh cycle means no “new” iPhone until October 2012. And that’s just too late. The iPhone is the number one product in Apple’s entire portfolio to neglect it by not expanding the lineup and by not countering the near endless lineup of 4 inch screen iPhone competitors would be shocking.

There are only really two options.

1. Apple for whatever reason is going to try and hold on with an updated iPhone 4. Maybe Apple wants the iPhone 5 to be the LTE/4G iPhone next summer.  A huge marketing push for the new device with the upgraded data connection will then be created.

2. After the disaster with the iPhone 4 being lost in California and completely leaked in Vietnam before that, for Tim Cook’s first product release event Apple has managed to keep the design and look of the iPhone 5 secret from all analysts and rumor sites with the only leak being to some case designers in China.

As MoD has been tracking, there’s confusion all over the Mac rumor following world as to what the new iPhone 5 will entail.

Highlighting that confusion is a great post by 9 to 5 Mac. It started with a number of Mac web sites ran with the story that the icon in the newest iPhoto/Photostream beta doesn’t really look like a current iPhone. Here’s the blown up image from Macrumors.

As you can see the blown up image does not resemble the current iPhone and seems more in line with the previous specs reported by MacRumors. Now it’s just an image icon in a piece of beta software but it’s the kind of detail that would obsessively be updated for iCloud/Photo Stream, but then forgotten about when released for beta testing.

So the icon places up back to the iPhone 4s (cheaper version) and new big screen iPhone 5 flagship device.

However, 9 to Mac analyzing the icon image like it’s the Zapruder film comes up with new iPhone designs. Their blown up rendering of the icon leads to this design

A 3.7 inch iPhone that is actually smaller than the current design and would represent a new class of iPhone not a re-engineered cheaper iPhone 4. HUH? Okay so Apple is releasing a new iPhone 5 that’s smaller than the iPhone 4 but has a bigger screen? An iPhone Nano? Not satisfied with that new rumor, 9to5 quotes a sources as saying “One was called the ‘upgraded one, the iPhone 5′ and the other, ‘a new smaller one’.” Working off that rumor 9to5 posts their image of a big screen iPhone 5 with a 4 inch or greater screen. Either way my current iPhone 4 is suffering from screen size envy.

To end the confusing portion of this post, M.I.C Gadget posts a huge gallery of iPhone 5 cases from China.
Now the case manufacturers could have it all wrong, and may have to eat a huge selection of cheap plastic cases, but the sheer variety and number of cases certainly lends some credence to the manufacturer’s confidence in their stolen design specs. This image probably does the best job of showing the tapered look of the alleged new iPhone design

Any MoD readers feel like ordering a couple of thousand bootleg iPhone 5 cases, world marketing website Alibaba.com has a bunch of them. Here are my favorites

http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/491929998/New_arrivel_5G_silicon_case_for.html

http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/492409652/new_arrive_5G_silicon_case_for/showimage.html

All summer long MoD has maintained that the rumors sites are being confused by two separate iPhones the cheaper 4s and the brand new design flagship big screen iPhone 5.

Now MacRumors is trying to say that the iPhone 5 will be a reworked iPhone 4 again, the iPhone 4+. This is based mainly off the fact that this reworked iPhone 4 model appears to have the A5 chip. I’m not sure based on that fact alone that I’d make the leap towards a rehashed iPhone 4+.

Digitimes also has restated rumors of the iPhone 5 having a smaller than 4 inch screen. However, along with that rumor they are still stating that the new iPhone will be thinner. It’s almost like the dual new iPhones being prepared have created a game of telephone for the rumor sites where they keep getting details mixed up and confused.

While having no knowledge of Apple’s plans, this doesn’t make any sense at all.

If Apple is planning on releasing a free with contract iPhone 4s (8GB of memory, available unlocked for $350/400 range) which will obviously use the iPhone 4 form factor, how will Apple be able to sell an upgraded iPhone 4+ for $199?

If Apple is simply updating the iPhone 4, then why was there a 3 month perceived delay in release? If Apple is taking the iPhone 4 to the low end, then you have to have a different product for the high end. And it cannot be reliant on a chipset difference or improved camera, Apple has done a great job making sure customers don’t care about such specifics.  Retina Display could possibly be a difference maker but a lower resolution screen would really cheapen and devalue the iPhone 4s. Removing it weakens the low end iPhone 4 considerably. No, Apple is reducing the costs of the iPhone 4 in terms of production (easier to assemble) and some materials (plastic back perhaps not the now famous Gorilla Glass). And perhaps be willing to accept a lower margin (although many of the R/D  and other introduction costs of the device are already paid off) on the iPhone 4S. While launching on all 4 US carrier and new Chinese carriers, Apple needs a new the flagship iPhone 5 design that could last into next year when upgraded with a 4 core processor and LTE (the real 4g network protocol) upgrades. The screen size is the giveaway. The Apple 3.5 inch screen will work great on a lower cost device, but the flagship phone needs a 4 inch screen to be ultra competitive against the flood of big screen Android, Win Phone 7 and Nokia FinWin 7 phones coming out this fall.

I won’t go into any speculative detail into the ominous reason that we all thought, resignation as pre obit. Hopefully Steve has many more wonderful years with his family left.

Presuming no health crisis, why resign now?

It’s obvious Steve’s state of health won’t allow him to return full time in the same way he was before. Steve is not a guy of half measures or half attempts. The decision was probably as simple as his public statement sounds. He cannot be the old Steve, and nothing less is acceptable. In pure speculation, Steve has been rumored to be in China helping to finalize some carrier deals. That level of travel may have highlighted that Steve’s health will never return to pre transplant levels. Steve may have also realized that Tim Cook needed to be the real CEO to have the real power to negotiate these deals.

It could be as simple as now is the right time to move on. Apple’s about to have a huge media event announcing the next iPhone. If the rumors are close, this could be the biggest launch since the iPhone 3G. The iPad is crushing folks. The MacBook Air is selling out. iOS 5 is almost finished. The Retina screen iPad 3 seems to be deep in final development for an early 2012 release. The new HQ is planned and approved. Apple is rolling in every segment, so it is best equipped to absorb the hit of Steve leaving his CEO role right now.

What’s the immediate product impact? Very little.

Somewhere at the secret Top 100 meeting this year (or last year)  a road map of where Steve wants to take the next generation of iPhones, iPads, Macs, etc was presented. At Apple HQ right now, there are mockups/prototypes of the iPhone 7 and the iPad 4. In addition, there’s probably a road map for brand new products for the next 2 or 3 years.

In the deciding the product lineup,  Steve says No to a lot of projects. This discipline in saying No is now built into Apple’s DNA. Steve is also a master of saying No, but come back to me when we can do X. The iPad and iPhone are classic Steve examples of saying Not Ready Yet. Steve kept telling his guys to work on the projects until the right pieces were ready. Touchscreens, powerful energy efficient microprocessors, cheap solid state memory, battery technology improvements are examples of outside innovations that Apple used with their in house innovations. Like most pundits, MoD thinks Apple will do something evolutionary with the TV, and it will seem obvious and easy and make the TV as interconnected as the iPhone and iPad. Apple has prototypes right now that are Not Ready Yet. The designs are missing a piece of tech, not responsive enough, or are too expensive right now to source and build. And I think as long as Steve is healthy enough, he will continue to be a final product sanity check indicating readiness to go into production or that a product needs more time to bake. He just won’t be so intimately involved in every possible decision and facet of product design. It could be this change in work load can extend Steve’s influence at Apple by a significant number of years, and that change was the decisive reason for Steve stepping down.

So beyond the new product roadmap at Apple, Steve has doubtlessly laid a Not Ready for Prime Time road map. The Newton is an obvious example of a product being too far ahead of the technology available. This list probably goes out ten years plus in terms of innovations and new ideas. This future road map has a list of key benchmarks for  improvements in displays, battery life, memory storage, processor speed, lightweight materials, etc. and connected to those improvement targets are a list of new Apple products. Wonder when you will have a Minority Report like display from Apple? Just wait, Apple has all the pieces to make it happen it just needs display and multi-touch technology to improve.

MoD has been arguing for a while that the two most obvious competitors to the iPad  would be HP and Samsung, two companies with retail consumer electronics that were not reliant upon carrier distribution deals to sell hardware. Both companies knew how to manage inventory with big box retailers and how to display their gear in big box retail environments. That was MoD’s rationale. Seemed solid to us.

Well the TouchPad has hit the market like a giant flaming turd. Despite decent ads (not as good as the Apple ads, even the Samsung commercials are better. The Russell Brand search themed ad is quite good. ) on a reasonable rotation on network and cable tv, there’s zero movement at all. The story of only 20,000 TouchPads being sold by Best Buy out of an inventory of 270,000 reach critical mass and based on the speed that Apotheker killed the TouchPad the sales story must be awful across all vendors. With no new phones or tablets from HP, WebOS is well on the way to being the Amiga of the Mobile OS wars. The best OS with many advocates that cannot find any traction at all from customers, and seems to be mismanaged by the owners.

So WebOS is done. Android for tablets is struggling, and Android itself is under extreme IP attack. If we could track sell to rates for all tablet vendors, it’s quite possible that Apple can end this year at 90% tablet market share. And the iPad 3 is looming. It’s being readied. Since most vendors will report ship to rates, it will be closer to 65 to 70% depending upon the key 4th qtr and economic scares. One last scary note for tablet vendors, there are reports of TouchPad ‘s being sold effectively at closeout prices of $199. Is that the price point needed to get “traction” (to borrow a term from John Gruber’s recent Talk Show Podcast) against a $499 Apple iPad? Can anyone afford to build an iPad quality tablet at that price point without going bankrupt?

So who is left to take on the iPad?

RIM – their device is getting little traction and carriers are starting to reject selling the Playbook. And the Playbook is still a 7 inch device at iPad prices. RIM in hindsight would have been better off focusing all the engineering energy from the PlayBook into their QNX phones. Right now, those phones not a weak tablet represent their last best shot at being relevant. And the Playbook dev environment is still in the infant stage.

Samsung – hindered by the Android tablet market. However, they at least appear ready to compete. The biggest issue Apple’s legal campaign against the Galaxy Tab. Also, Google’s new hardware division has to scare them. Also, as a Windows PC vendor, Samsung has to be waiting on Windows 8 and what that means.

Windows 8 – Just when you think Microsoft’s glacial response to the iPad will be too late, every other competitor is dropping the ball leaving room for Microsoft to claim the second position. Unlike any other player Microsoft will not give up quickly. They will keep developing and improving. We’ve seen it work recently with the XBox 360 and fail with the Zune. They will likely be facing a tremendously powerful entrenched opponent in the iPad teamed with the powerful iPhone, the ultimate tag team in the mobile gadget war. The real question is whether the tablet war is the PC battle from the late 80s, or the MP3-iPod battle, or something completely different. It’s impossible to make any projection without seeing any sample tablets running Windows 8. The Wintel folks cannot match the MacBook Air, can they build something that runs Windows 8 that matches the relative speed of the iPad. We know what the iPad is going to be like in 2012, quad core ARM based processor, gig of RAM, enhanced video capability, and a Retina Display. And it’s a moving target in terms of price.

Amazon – Amazon has the media library to challenge the iOS – iTunes duopoly. Amazon has had success establishing a brand name electronic device. Kindle is a big hit. Amazon is the wildcard. And they maybe planning a cheaper tablet device that targets the cheapest price point possible. Amazon might be willing to further reduce the price to sell their higher margin media content. However, Amazon could cripple the device from a video performance standpoint or as rumored it could be significantly thicker than the iPad and appear clunky or cheap. Also, Amazon’s will probably push their own application and media stores exclusively and could run into problems with Google denying them access to the latest Android builds.