Cult of Mac has some infographics on the amount of consensus regarding rumoured iPhone 5 features. I put these into three categories:
– Beneficial
– Better
– Change with pain factor
How the features fall into each category may change as more is known about them especially with regards to what customer value they provide.
Beneficial category:
– Larger screen (benefit depends on how software uses this)
– Faster (LTE) networking
– Better camera
– Better bluetooth networking (or NFC which is less likely; new payment capabilities would be huge)
– Faster processor (improves everything but example benefit is airplay mirroring which currently requires at least the 4S model)
– More memory
– Maintaining or increasing battery life with new features
– New and improved IOS 6 software (this requires its own review)
Better category but maybe not a customer driver for upgrade:
– Thinner
– Metal back for increased durability
Change with pain factor:
– New smaller connector (need to change cables and docks with what customer benefit?)
– New location for headphone jack (ability to use headphone when docked?)
– new size for SIM card (any reason to care?)
Looking at the rumoured new features – if they are delivered – once again Apple will have done enough to drive people to upgrade to the new model. This is getting harder each year as it is not easy to outdo previous models which are getting closer and closer to being feature complete from a hardware perspective. You can always bump the processing, memory, battery life, camera resolution, etc but there comes a point where improvements may be less compelling from the perspective of allowing you to actually do more or experience perceptible speed or other differences. Dimensions of the device may also be getting closer and closer to being optimal because even if it is technically possible to deliver a thinner device, for example, will that translate into a better experience for the customer?
Going forward – IOS, cloud syncing, Siri voice interaction, third party software, sensors, and integration improvements will become more and more important as differentiators. The next great leap might also be the inclusion of powerful projector capabilities that could somehow be squeezed into the extremely small packaging. This will be quite a challenge from a packaging, battery, heat, user interface, and user training perspectives but it would be a game changing part of “sixth sense” interface to bridge the current gap between the virtual and real worlds. Considering the significant packaging associated challenges maybe the micro-projector might be a separate device that uses the iPhones high speed networking to augment its capabilities as could be implemented with other external sensors. This has the added benefit of allowing this accessory to be independently directed and used with other Apple devices too.
