Eyet Blogs: smartphone

Showing posts with label smartphone. Show all posts

Thursday, April 3, 2008

Research In Motion Delivers Outstanding 4Q and Yearly Results

Research In Motion Limited (RIM) (NASDAQ: RIMM) one of the Top 20 Innovators of The Innovation Index reported results for the three months and fiscal year ended March 1, 2008.
Revenue for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2008 was $1.88 billion, up 102% from $930.4 million in the same quarter of last year. Revenue for the fiscal year ended March 1, 2008 was $6.01 billion, up 98% from $3.04 billion last year. Operating income for the fiscal year ended March 1, 2008 was $1.73 billion, up 114% from $807 million last year. RIM shipped 4.4 million smartphones in the fourth quarter and approximately 14 million smartphones during fiscal 2008.
Approximately 2.18 million net new BlackBerry(R) subscriber accounts were added in the quarter. At the end of the quarter, the total BlackBerry subscriber account base was over 14 million.
Future Earnings Guidance
Revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2009 ending May 31, 2008 is expected to be in the range of $2.23-$2.30 billion. Net subscriber account additions in the first quarter are expected to be approximately 2.2 million. Earnings per share for the first quarter are expected to be in the range of $0.82-$0.86 per diluted share.

Bottomline:
RIM business shows no signs of slowdown from the economy. RIM beat the high end of revenue and earnings estimates for the latest quarter, and also gave a solid, uplifting outlook for the first quarter. RIM is firing on all cylinders thanks to the growth of consumer Blackberry smartphone business. "Heightened retail activities helped drive exceptional subscriber growth during the fourth quarter with net subscriber account additions growing more than 32% over the previous quarter and well over 2 million net subscriber accounts added in a single quarter for the first time," said Jim Balsillie, Co-CEO at Research In Motion. On a conference call to discuss the results, co-Chief Executive Jim Balsillie said 38% of the company's subscriber base are individuals or other non-enterprise users. Bastille also said more than half of RIM's new subscribers were non-enterprise customers. RIM is able to penetrate a new and growing consumer market of smartphones, grow the topline revenue, and is able to do this while maintaining the overall margins. The biggest advantage that RIM has over other smartphone makers is that the major wireless partners all sell RIM Blackberry smartphones - Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and AT&T (NYSE: T), another Top 20 Innovator of The Innovation Index. This creates tremendous marketing and distribution leverage.

RIM shares are up 9% in 2008. Innovation Index Group maintains a BUY rating on RIM with a Q4, 2008 share price target of $135 to $145. If RIM continues to deliver outstanding results for the rest of 2008, it is quite possible for RIM shares to surge beyond $150 in 2008. If RIM can add 2 million new accounts and ship over 4.4 million new smartphones, will Apple iPhone do equal or better in 2008? Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is a Top 20 Innovator of The Innovation Index. Innovation Index Group believes that Apple will ship over 12 million iPhones in 2008. RIM and Apple are poised to kick their smartphone business into overdrive in 2008.

About Innovation Index Group:

Innovation Index Group, Inc. is a new investment management company focused on systematically identifying, tracking and investing in the most innovative publicly traded companies in North America – collectively called the Innovation Index. We have developed the Innovation Index Fund, LLC as our first vehicle to invest in the Innovation Index. Over the past six years, the Innovation Index has generated a gross average annual return of 40%*.

Innovation Index Group, Inc. and Innovation Index Fund LLC are registered California Corporations, and member of the Irvine Chamber of Commerce in Orange County. Further, Innovation Index Fund LLC is a private placement investment partnership organized under the California state regulations.

The Innovation Index Reports:

Invest in The Innovation Index - Innovation Index Fund tracks The Innovation Index
The Innovation Index closes 2007 at 66%* - 2007 Annual Report on the Innovation Index
Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world - 2007 Report on Top 50 Innovative Companies
Annual Report - Chapter One - Total Innovation Activity - 2006 Annual Report One
Annual Report - Chapter Two - The Top Innovator - 2006 Annual Report Two
Annual Report - Chapter Three - The Innovation Insights - 2006 Annual Report Insights
Innovation and Stock Performance Correlation - The Innovation Index and Stock Performance

About The Innovation Index

The Innovation Index introduced in December 2006 is a weighted stock price index of the top 20 Innovators in North America.

The Innovation Index returned 66% in 2007, and returned 174% over the previous five years (2002-2006). This assumes equal investment in each stock of The Innovation Index as of December 31, 2001. An average of $100 invested in The Innovation Index on December 31, 2001 returned $454 as of December 31, 2007. By comparison, $100 invested in S & P 500 returned 28% or $129, $100 invested in NASDAQ returned 34% or $136, and $100 invested in the Dow Jones Index returned 30% or $131 through December 31, 2007. The Innovation Index beats the S & P 500, NASDAQ and Dow Jones Index by more than seven times over the past six years.*

Alphabetical list of the Top 20 Innovators of The Innovation Index for 2008 and their stock ticker symbols:

3M Company - (NYSE: MMM)
Amazon.com, Inc. - (NASDAQ: AMZN)
America Movil - (NYSE: AMX)
Apple Inc. - (NASDAQ: AAPL)
AT&T Inc. - (NYSE: T)
Best Buy Co., Inc. - (NYSE: BBY)
Cisco Systems, Inc. - (NASDAQ: CSCO)
Costco Wholesale Corporation - (NASDAQ: COST)
eBay Inc. - (NASDAQ: EBAY)
General Electric Co. - (NYSE: GE)
Google Inc. - (NASDAQ: GOOG)
Hewlett-Packard Co. - (NYSE: HPQ)
Intel Corporation - (NASDAQ: INTC)
International Business Machines Corp. - (NYSE: IBM)
Merck & Co., Inc. - (NYSE: MRK)
McDonald's Corporation (NYSE: MCD)
Microsoft Corporation - (NASDAQ: MSFT)
NIKE, Inc. - (NYSE: NKE)
Research In Motion Limited - (NASDAQ: RIMM)
The Proctor & Gamble Company - (NYSE: PG)

The Innovation Index will analyze the positions and standings of the Top 20 Innovators at the end of each year. For 2008, there will be no further changes in The Innovation Index.

Disclaimer: The Innovation Index Group, Inc. invests in the stocks comprising The Innovation Index.
*Past Performance Does Not Guarantee Future Results

References:
RIM Press Release and Conference Call

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Apple iPhone Post Launch Frenzy

Apple iPhone was launched on June 29, 2007.

Unconfirmed reports indicated high-end sales of over 700,000 iPhones during the first two days of launch (June 29, June 30), and over 1,000,000 in the first few days. iPhones were sold out at most AT&T (NYSE: T) and Apple stores. "Shoppers may have taken home as many as 700,000 iPhones over the weekend, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. analyst David Bailey has estimated, twice his initial projection. Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs has sought to use the connection to the iPod business, which pulls in about $10 billion in revenue a year, to reach his goal of selling 10 million phones in 2008."

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) stock traded as high as $134.50 on Tuesday, July 10, 2007 marking an all-time high for the company. Apple is scheduled to announce the quarterly earnings report on July 25, 2007 after market close.

Apple may introduce new, cheaper iPhone by Fall 2007

According to Forbes story, in a note to clients, J.P. Morgan analyst Kevin Chang said based on a patent Apple filed in November, he thinks a new iPhone is coming that will cost $300 or less. It is likely to be controlled by a scroll wheel, and might have limited functionality. He said the patent filing showed how to dial a phone number with the scroll wheel.

"We believe it's a strong sign that Apple could potentially convert every iPod nano into a nano phone," he wrote, referring to the company's popular flash memory-based music player.

The nano currently sells for $149 to $249, depending on the amount of included memory. The nano and Apple's shuffle iPod comprise the majority of the estimated 50 million iPods the company sells each year, Chang said.

Chang said there's "a decent chance" that Apple will accept operator subsidies for a cheaper iPhone model, which could sell 30 million to 40 million units in fiscal year 2008.

"The global introduction of this model should be much faster than iPhone, given the former's limited functionality and lower customization requirement," he wrote
Apple Competition

Motorola Needs To Be Quicker To Prevent The Big Squeeze
CNNMoney.com - 9 Jul 2007
Apple Inc .'s (AAPL) initial success with the iPhone increases the pressure on Motorola Inc . (NYSE: MOT) to move faster to launch exciting new products.With the popularity.....

Apple has not yet announced an European partner for the newly launched iPhone. There is speculation that O2 could be the chosen one.

Bottomline:

If Apple indeed sold over 1 million iPhones during the first week of launch, Apple is well poised to best its own estimate of 10 million iPhones during the first year of launch. This will be phenomenal. And the cheaper iPhone will only help cement the lead for the foreseeable future. Can Apple achieve the impossible barrier set by Motorola back in 2004-2006 of 60 million RAZR phones? Even if Apple sells over 10 million iPhones during the first year, the meaningful total impact on the revenue would only be about a third of the actual sales price, or about $1.6 billion in accountable revenue for the next fiscal year. This is owing to the fact that Apple will be counting the sale of the Apple iPhone over a two year period.

Who benefited most from the Apple iPhone launch besides Apple? Research In Motion Inc. (NASDAQ: RIMM) - RIM had an amazing quarter, beating profit and revenue estimates handily, besting all the analyst estimates, raising the quarterly estimates, and then announcing:

"As it prepares to do battle with the Apple (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ) iPhone, Research in Motion (nasdaq: RIMM - news - people ) told investors that, after eight years of trying, it's finally received the official green light to sell its sought-after BlackBerry device in China. RIM will serve corporate customers in cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou."

Apple has yet to determine its Asian partner for the iPhone, and will likely take a few years before entering the China market.

It's too early to predict as to who will emerge victorious in the Smartphone market: Apple, RIM, PALM or the emergence of Nokia, Samsung, LG, Motorola and more. For now, RIM has shown no signs of slowing down owing to the launch of the Apple iPhone. RIM CEO believes that all the interest around the smartphones actually helps RIM. RIM shares are trading at all time highs, and closed at $209.25 on July 10, 2007.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and RIM (NASDAQ: RIMM) are two of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index; Apple is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Also check out the following interesting stories about the Apple iPhone Launch:
Apple iPhone Rising - June 29 Liftoff - Top Ten Innovations

Three Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Four Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Five Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Seven Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Eight Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Nine Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Ten Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Launch

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 15 - June 29 Launch

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 14 - June 29 Launch

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 13 - June 29 Launch

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 3 - June 29 release

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 2

Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 1

References:

Forbes
Bloomberg

Friday, June 29, 2007

Apple iPhone Rising - June 29 Liftoff - Top Ten Innovations

Top Ten iPhone Innovations introduced by Apple's Creativity

Apple iPhone launches today, June 29, 2007.

Here are the Top Ten innovations introduced in iPhone by Apple:

1. Make calls by "simply pointing at a name or number." Get out of here... no buttons to click. No clicking umpteen times before you find the number you want to call. Point and Call. Welcome to the new touchscreen interface of iPhone. If you love the iPod interface, iPhone will only make it better.

2. Visual Voicemail, is definitely an industry first, a new innovation, that "lets users look at a listing of their voicemails, decide which messages to listen to, then go directly to those messages without listening to the prior messages." How useful is this? How often and how long you have to wait to hear that all important message from your very important friend, or boss until all the messages before are heard? If you are a frequent cell phone user, the answer is all the time. Apple understands the users' frustration as they check their voice mails, and Visual Voicemail will change the way you listen to your voice messages, and even save you minutes spent in waiting to hear that all important message. Oh, and you can even ignore earlier messages from that certain friend.

3. SMS move over. No more clicking 3 or 4 or more times to get to that letter that you want to type now. How about a touch keyboard that is predictive, full QWERT, and even prevents mistakes. Oh my. Finally, SMS will become easier, simpler, faster, friendlier, and bigger!! If you love SMS, iPhone is it. Recent reviewers have indicated that SMS on the iPhone needs a bit of getting used to; but once you do, you won't go back to the old ways.

4. A handy 2 megapixel camera, with that all important Photo management software. Finally. Now you can organize the photos you take and use them for wallpapers, emails, upload and download them to your PC or MAC, and watch them on a 3.5-inch widescreen.

5. A widescreen iPod. How wide? 3.5-inch wide. You love iPod. You would love iPhone even more. It takes iPod to the next level. Literally. iPhone promises that you will now "touch" your music, videos, photos, songs, artists, albums, playlists - all at the click of a finger. And now you can enjoy all those TV shows in cool landscape mode. Add YouTube to the video mix, and now we are talking!!

6. Cover Flow in iPhone introduces a new way to "browse music library by album cover artwork, for the first time." When navigating your music library on iPhone, you are automatically switched into Cover Flow by simply rotating iPhone into its landscape position. Now, you can enjoy the album in the same way as you buy it from the music store.

7. iPhone brings your Rich Email with the graphics, photos and visuals along with text from your friends, family or work to the phone. The emails are downloaded in the background while you work, browse, message or call, and will work on most POP3 and IMAP services. And to top it off, Yahoo! Mail is integrated and readily available for the iPhone.

8. Web Browsing as good as computer. This could be a stretch. Although iPhone comes with the Safari (TM) web browser which provides all the features of web browsing for the computer on the iPhone. Could this be the last straw that finally breaks the camel's back, and brings the hordes of wireless phone users to web browsing? Not only you can see a web page as it was designed to be seen, iPhone allows you to "easily zoom in to expand any section by simply tapping on iPhone's multi- touch display with their finger." And with the Quad-Band GSM technology along with EDGE and Wi-Fi means "you can surf the web from just about anywhere," and even "automatically sync bookmarks from their PC or Mac."

9. Google Maps. On iPhone. No way. Yes way. Google's groundbreaking maps service and iPhone's amazing maps application tied together "offering the best maps experience by far on any pocket device." Easily and conveniently view maps, satellite images, traffic information and even get directions. Finally, you have everything local and global covered.

10. Artificial Intelligence. iPhone that thinks and senses and becomes one with what you do. iPhone has "advanced built-in sensors -- an accelerometer, a proximity sensor and an ambient light sensor" that "detects when the user has rotated the device from portrait to landscape, then automatically changes the contents of the display accordingly, with users immediately seeing the entire width of a web page, or a photo in its proper landscape aspect ratio." Are you kidding me? No wait. There's more. iPhone also has "proximity sensor detects when you lift iPhone to your ear and immediately turns off the display to save power and prevent inadvertent touches until iPhone is moved away." Wait a moment. Finally, "iPhone's built-in ambient light sensor automatically adjusts the display's brightness to the appropriate level for the current ambient light, thereby enhancing the user experience and saving power at the same time."

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index, and is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Two Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

"Apple Inc.'s iPhone won't hit stores until Friday, but the heavily hyped gadget already has unleashed a cottage industry of touch-screen protectors, leather hip carriers and car adapters.

Even the most enthusiastic manufacturers said creating formfitting iPhone accessories was an enormous challenge. A notoriously tightlipped Apple kept many partners in the dark on precise specifications, and some of the company's most trusted accessory manufacturers still have not touched a genuine iPhone.

To compensate, many cribbed size and weight specifications from Apple's Web site, then created models out of wood, cardboard or plastic. They shipped models to Apple for advice on whether headset and other outlets were placed correctly. They adjusted and resent revised versions to Apple." - Source: BusinessWeek

"Motorola, the world's second-largest mobile handset maker is coming off a $118 million dollar first calendar quarter loss, notes the Financial Times, where its strategy to increase market share resulted in crisis.

Padmasree Warrior, chief technology officer for Motorola, told the financial paper that her firm is basing a comeback on a new generation of handsets, but admits that iPhone is of particular concern.
"I do worry about [the iPhone] because [Apple] is a great competitor; a very respectable, credible, tough competitor to have in the industry," she said.

At the same time, the exec believes the Apple device will appeal only to a "small part of the market" and hold its share of weaknesses. For instance, she said the phone's web browsing capability could have "severe limitations" because it will run on AT&T's slower 2.5G network, rather than the carrier's high-speed 3G network.

Motorola, which saw a resurgence after the launch of its RAZR handset in 2004, plans to unleash the second-generation of the super-slim handset sometime this summer. Like the firm's Q9 smartphone, the RAZR2 will reportedly run on the faster 3G networks." - Source: Apple Insider

"Vodafone is in talks with Apple to launch the U.S. firm's iPhone combined music player and telephone in Europe, and talks partly hinge on volume guarantees and subsidies, a Dutch magazine reported.

Apple demanded a guaranteed sales volume for the iPhone, which the British mobile operator did not want to give, Dutch magazine Bright said on its web site late on Tuesday.

The magazine said Vodafone was pushing for more scope to subsidize the phone and did not want Apple to have control of the sale price." - Source: Reuters UK

"Apple Inc.'s iPhone won a strong endorsement from a key technology reviewer on Tuesday, June 26 when the Wall Street Journal's Walter Mossberg called it a beautiful, breakthrough device.

"Our verdict is that, despite some flaws and feature omissions, the iPhone is, on balance, a beautiful and breakthrough handheld computer," Mossberg said in a review on WSJ.com.

New York Times technology writer David Pogue also weighed in with a largely positive review saying that the iPhone lived up to most of its considerable hype even if it did fall short in some areas." - Source: WSJ, New York Times

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index, and is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Bottomline:

If iPhone is a huge success, the iPhone accessories market will be another big hit. Case in point: iPod accessory market. iPhone has competitors worried, both in the U.S. and outside. In order to succeed globally though, Apple must put together a solid win-win plan to expand in Europe and Asia soon - within the next two months. Finally, reviews of iPhone are coming in, and are mostly optimistic - either the reviewers don't want to emphasize the flaws, or there are limited flaws - also, do they really want to bet against a winning horse when there is so much hype, buzz, hysteria and more surrounding the launch? The consumers will soon find out whether the iPhone is for real on June 29.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Three Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Jessica Rodriguez joins the line to purchase an iPhone in front of an Apple store on Tuesday, June 26, 2007 in New York. The much-promoted mobile phone from Apple goes on sale Friday in U.S. markets. For Jessica Rodriguez, waiting four days for an iPhone is nothing when the prize is "the next big thing."

On Tuesday, Rodriguez became the fourth person to line up outside Apple Inc.'s Fifth Avenue store in New York. The 24-year-old college student wants to get a belated birthday gift for her sister as soon as the iPhone starts selling Friday evening.
"Words can't express why I want an iPhone," Rodriguez said, sitting in a red folding chair she brought. "The main reason is (Apple CEO) Steve Jobs is a genius. He's a great innovator. It's going to be the next big thing in cell phones.".....Click here for the complete story
"I'll probably get the world's worst sunburn,'' said Eric Mueller, a graphic designer from Harlem who's fifth in line at the Fifth Avenue store, the only Apple outlet that's open 24 hours a day. "But it's exciting to be part of it.''
For others, it's about earning some extra cash. John May, a college student in Vallejo, California, has offered to stand in line for $250 for a potential iPhone buyer. He'll wait at an Apple store in Vallejo or Walnut Creek. Although no one has responded to his ad on Craigslist, May said he'll still join the line for latecomers.
"It seems like an easy way to make cash,'' said May, 18, who said his dad gave him the idea. "It's crazy.''

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index, and is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Bottomline:

Fans are beginning to clamor for the brand new Apple iPhone which is due out at 6:00 p.m. on June 29. The lines will only get bigger by June 29 morning, and expect dozens to hundreds of anxious buyers waiting outside the key Apple and AT&T stores to try and buy the iPhone. Even the $59.99 monthly plan that includes 450 minutes and unlimited data services among other features will not deter the die-hard Apple aficionados. Most analysts are predicting 100,000 to 200,000 iPhone unit sales by June 30. If you cannot wait for the iPhone, don't want to stand in line for days or hours, and are searching for an alternative, check this review of iPhone competitors by Marketwatch: Wireless device makers target iPhone crowd - LG, Nokia and target high-end users, but devices lack carrier support.

Also check the following interesting stories about Apple iPhone:

References:

Customers line up for iPhone launch
By ANICK JESDANUN
AP INTERNET WRITER

New Yorkers camp out for iPhone despite summer heat
IPhone fever takes hold in the Big Apple

Monday, June 25, 2007

Four Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

The following table shows estimates for unit sales of the Apple iPhone from various analysts, including my own:

Bottomline:

The average estimate from all the analysts including the Apple Innovation Blog is over 1 million units of Apple iPhone sold by September 30, 2007, and 8.74 million units of Apple iPhone sold in the next year by September 30, 2008 for a total of 9.74 million units sold from June 29 launch through September 30, 2008. Even if Apple iPhone sells closer to 7.5 million units in the first full year of launch, this would be considered highly successful, and would easily eclipse the first full year of launch sales of the Apple iPod. However, Steve Jobs' and Apple's sights are much higher - the Motorola RAZR sold 50 million units from 2004 to 2006. Can iPhone come close to the breakout success of the RAZR?

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index, and is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Also check:

Five Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Seven Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Eight Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Nine Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Ten Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 15 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 14 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 13 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 3 - June 29 release
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 2
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 1

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Five Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Bob Rehm has seen the commercials, he’s witnessed the hype, and he really couldn’t care less that the iPhone is about to drop in Southwest Florida.

Yes, it’s a cell phone that can hold pictures, MP3s files, and includes a Web browser complete with Google search and map functions. Yes, it will be able to support wireless streaming of videos from YouTube.

And yes, it’s actually cooler — if that’s even possible — than the iPod, according to loyalists of the Apple brand.....

There's hype. There's hysteria. And there's history. The hype around Apple Inc.'s upcoming iPhone is abundantly clear. So is the hysteria. But how the iPhone will leave its historical mark after Friday's launch is to be seen.

Will the gadget - which triples as a cell phone, iPod media player and a wireless Web device - be as "revolutionary" as Apple CEO Steve Jobs has claimed?

Even if the product flops for some reason or stays limited to the high-end corner of the smart phone market, the iPhone has already jolted the industry, showing that it is not just the body and outward beauty of the handset that counts, but what's inside....

Remember the television ads for the Motorola RAZR?
The commercials showed off the sexy, thin profile of the clamshell handset and seduced more than 50 million people from 2004 to 2006 to buy it, making it the most popular cell phone ever sold.

But people want more now. There are plenty of slim, ultra-thin options out there, but not many make finding photos, saving phone contacts, picking up voice mail and selecting ringtones insanely easy.

"This is the most anticipated phone since Alexander Graham Bell did his," said Michael Gartenberg, an industry analyst at JupiterResearch. "Part of it is the fascination with Apple's products and how well they design them, but it's also about how poor the design in software is in cell phones now, and how much time Apple has spent working on this."

Apple's iPhone commercials show a finger swiping the touch screen display to activate the home menu, and with one tap on the photo icon, up pop your photos. Another icon zips over to your contacts.

Not a drop-down menu in sight.

"A few handset makers have been trying to make the phone simpler without having to refer to a manual that's 18 times the size of the phone," said Richard Doherty, president of The Envisioneering Group, a research company. "But Apple is going for the moon here.".....

Oakland Web programmer David Stillman, 21, hopes to be the first of his friends to own an iPhone.
Stillman, who has three Macintosh computers and two iPods, plans to trade in his two-year-old Sanyo phone for the high-end $599 iPhone if the all-inclusive monthly charges come to less than $100. Apple and AT&T Inc. - the exclusive carrier for the iPhone - have not yet disclosed the service charges.
Stillman says the best iPhone features appear to be the simple access to Google Inc.'s online maps and route directions and the intuitive user interface, which allows for easy scrolling through a contact list, fast searches through photo albums and quick callback for missed calls and recently dialed numbers.
Also, instead of just listening to voicemail in the order received, Apple has created what it calls "visual voicemail" for iPhone, an innovative way to see the list of voice messages so users can quickly choose the one they want to hear.
"The software is going to sell this phone - it's going to be so easy and obvious and will correct a lot of problems in other phones," said Stillman, who was waiting for Apple's flagship retail store in San Francisco to open Friday morning to do some shopping. "Other phones - even BlackBerrys - can do a million things but you can't figure out how to do anything on them.".....

Bottomline:

Oh my!! The buzz that the Apple iPhone has created pre-launch is unprecedented. As Steve Jobs will have you believe, iPhone is the coolest mobile phone, "it's all about the software inside", and the ease-of-use, the intuitive interface, the touchscreen, the iPod music player, the comprehensive Safari Internet browser, the YouTube video, the visual voice mail, the Google Maps, the pictures, the artificial intelligence, the photos, the wireless connectivity.....and more. Just one or two of these killer features have to be a big hit for the iPhone to rival the success of the iPod or the Motorola Razr. What will these features be? Would it be the Internet browsing? Would it be the music? Would it be the video? Or the fact that it would be the easiest mobile phone to operate. Would iPhone software come in the way of its operations and konk out when you are calling someone? Is the iPhone tested fully? Would iPhone connection be available everywhere and there would be no more "Can you hear me?". The industry is eagerly waiting for perhaps the biggest product launch of the 21st century.

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is one of the top 20 innovators of The Innovation Index, and is the Number One Innovator for 2007 as per the rankings of the Top 50 Innovative Companies in the world by BusinessWeek.

Also check:

Seven Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Eight Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Nine Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff
Ten Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 15 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 14 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 13 - June 29 Launch
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 3 - June 29 release
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 2
Countdown to Apple iPhone Launch - Day 1

References:

Fans already saying ‘iWant the iPhone’ By Jessie L. Bonner
Originally published — 2:21 p.m., June 23, 2007
Updated — 10:20 p.m., June 23, 2007

Associated Press
Industry Awaits 'Revolutionary' IPhone
By MAY WONG
06.24.07, 4:04 PM ET

Friday, June 22, 2007

Seven Days to Apple iPhone Launch - June 29 Liftoff

Apple Inc.'s iPhone was a top choice in a survey of people who plan to buy an advanced mobile phone in the next three months, a sign the new device may take market share from rivals.
The survey by ChangeWave Research found that 26 percent of likely buyers would choose the iPhone, a combination mobile phone and iPod that will go on sale June 29. It was tied for first place with Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry. The research firm asked 3,489 U.S. consumers if they planned to buy an advanced mobile phone, and if so, what brand they would choose.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) , based in Cupertino, California, is betting the iPhone's features such as a touch screen will lure customers away from the BlackBerry and Palm Inc.'s Treo. The U.S. market for so- called smart phones, which offer e-mail functions, music players and cameras, may grow 43 percent this year to almost $6 billion, according to research firm Strategy Analytics.
"It appears that the Apple iPhone will have a huge impact on the smart-phone market,'' ChangeWave said in the report. The device "poses an enormous challenge to the entire industry.''
ChangeWave, based in Rockville, Maryland, said 7.8 percent of the consumers surveyed planned to buy an advanced phone within the next 90 days. The study was conducted in April.

Bottomline:

If the market of smartphones indeed grows to $6 billion this year, and 26 percent of likely buyers will choose the iPhone, this would translate to $1.56 billion in total revenue for the new iPhone in the first year. At an average sale of $549 per iPhone, the number of new iPhones sold in the first year could eclipse 2.84 million units. Most analysts predict that the first year sales of the new iPhone would be in the range of 3.5 million to 4 million units. This means, that an additional 1 million iPhones will be snapped up by existing iPod owners. With 100 million iPod owners all over the world, 1 million translates to only 1% of the entire population. It is plausible that at least 10% of the iPod owners would buy the new iPhone - this alone creates a market of 10 million new iPhones. The question then is really about the timing. How soon will Apple sell 10 million new iPhones? Would it take only two years, or closer to five years? The success of Apple and the new iPhone will be entirely defined by rapid acceleration of new iPhone sales. Anything less than the sale of a few million iPhones in the first year would be construed a failure.