iPhone Investigator

Piper Jaffray’s analyst Gene Munster has released a report that addresses some questions that have gone unanswered by Apple. Munster reports on Apple’s iPhone roadmap, pricing, and third party applications.

iPhone related questions include:

What is the iPhone’s hardware roadmap?
We continue to expect Apple to offer a family of iPhones (2-3 separate models) in the first half of 2009, including lower priced ($200-$300) models. Just as the company slowly diversified the iPod lineup and entered lower price points with every new version of the iPod, we expect Apple to launch new models of the iPhone at lower price points in CY09. This expectation, along with the expectation for lower price points, and world wide availability of the phone, is critical to our CY09 iPhone estimate of 45m units.

How is the price a carrier charges for the iPhone set?
Although Apple is able to garner a premium price for its devices, we believe its carrier partners are free to price the device at their discretion. In fact, when Apple’s carrier partner in the UK, O2, lowered the price of the 8GB iPhone by £100, the price of the same device on Apple’s UK Web-based store remained at the original, higher price. We believe one reason why wireless carriers were eager to sell the iPhone is that Apple can maintain a higher ASP; however Apple has made it clear that they are not hesitant to explore alternate pricing schemes. For example, the company is currently exploring a subsidized model in Germany with an 8GB phone going for as low as €99. Furthermore, we believe Apple is not hesitant to try business models other than the exclusive models the company has chosen during the iPhone’s first year. It has enabled Apple to maintain tight control on the user experience of the iPhone, but expanded availability will likely become a higher priority, and we believe it will eventually drive Apple to offer the iPhone on multiple carriers in each country.

What was the driver for the App Store on the iPhone for 3rd party applications?
The thriving iPhone hacking community adequately showed that there was significant demand for features the iPhone is capable of, but Apple is not offering. Games, instant messaging, and industry-specific applications are several examples of features that the iPhone does not currently offer in a native application setting. We believe Apple recognized that its user base was dissatisfied with the simplified Web 2.0 apps available on the iPhone’s web browser; as a result, the company announced the availability of 3rd party applications in March along with the iPhone operating system 2.0, which is on track to arrive in late June.

For more on Piper Jaffray’s Apple report, click here.

[via AppleInsider]

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