Six years after Apple Inc., the firm founded and run by legendary Steve Jobs, rocked the consumer electronics market with its revolutionary iPod, the portable digital music player, music lovers across the world found yet another reason to cheer on January 9, 2007, when Jobs announced the prologue of a fresh bonanzathe Apple iPhone. The announcement came on the heels of Apple Computer Inc.'s move to peel off its "computer only" image by shedding the "computer" from its name. Analysts have cheered the move. Tim Bajarin, Principal Analyst with the consultancy firm, Creative Strategies, remarked, "This goes beyond smart phones and should be given its own category called `brilliant' phones." Wall Street too cheered the launch by pushing Apple shares to $92.57, an all-time closing high, while knocking down the shares of rival firms, Treo-maker Palm by 5.7%, BlackBerry's Research in Motion by 7.9% and Motorola by 1.8%.
The phone that has generated much hype is a tiny 135 gram gadget assembling three productsa revolutionary mobile phone, a widescreen iPod with touch controls, and a breakthrough Internet communications device with desktop-class e-mail, Web browsing, maps, and searching all rolled into one small and lightweight hand-held device. The 3.5-inch widescreen display and a clever touch-screen technology prove its elegance over all other conventional smart phones, where the cumbersome keypads and tiny screens reduce the charm of navigating a music playlist. And if industry experts are to be believed, the iPhone, which costs between $499 (base model with internal memory of 4 gigabytes) and $599 (high-end model with internal memory of 8 gigabytes; same as LG's PRADA), is more likely to appeal to the high-end consumer segment, which comprises of about 10% of the wireless phone market. |
