MAC BLOG SAFARI
Mac Bloggers: All Eyes on iPhone

The dominant coverage this week, however, is not only about how it will shake out in future models -- bloggers are covering where it's not.

With Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) retail outlets -- including the high-profile stores in New York City -- running out of stock, rumors are running wild. Is there a new 3G model coming sooner than expected? Is there a supply chain problem? Is demand surging? What gives?

The Shortage

Apple didn't respond to requests for information surrounding iPhone supply and demand, which is not unexpected from the secretive company.

Much of the blog traffic started courtesy of Apple expert Gene Munster, a financial analyst for Piper Jaffray. Munster provided a set of Apple-focused reports to investors this week, and he believes -- because stockpiles of the iPhone are so low across the U.S. -- that there's an 80 percent chance that an update to the iPhone might come earlier than anticipated. The other 20 percent represents the chance that the shortages are due to a supply chain or production problem.

"Apple has been very good at managing their supply line so I'm in the camp that something new is coming soon. It might be 3G, or it might be a 32 gig iPhone -- or both in one," noted kenaustus, a commenter on the Apple Insider post on the iPhone supply issue.

"Maybe Apple will go with a 'quiet' introduction, again paying out no money for millions of dollars in promotion by the media and internet. If they send out an invitation for something new the media will be able to react within hours if needed," kenaustus added.

Another commenter, Restalot, made an even more optimistic prediction on the subject of U.S. supply: "The cause of the iPhone shortage is obvious (as I pointed out a few days ago) ... Apple is routing all their stock for a massive Canadian launch."

While it's true that Canadians have been clamoring for iPhones, there's been little action for our friends to the north, and Restalot signed his post with a rueful: ":End Fantasy (again)".

Supply Chain Problem More Likely?

While Apple may be readying for new product launch, the company's prediction that it would sell 10 million iPhones seems to indicate a solid confidence in demand. A manufacturing problem doesn't seem too likely -- especially since there's been a distinctive lack of hardware failure reports.

"What typically happens, a company like Apple -- or HP (NYSE: HPQ) , or anybody -- will cut a big order so that vendors can set up their supply chains," Ken Dulaney, a vice president of mobile and wireless analysis for Gartner (NYSE: IT) , told MacNewsWorld. "Then they cut purchase orders underneath that -- ship a million here, 100,000 there -- and those POs can be time-sensitive, country-specific, carrier-specific, it's hard to say. Apple could have recycled the tail end of that 10 million order into a new product, or they could have misjudged where they wanted the volume, and that could be the case, but they've got to have more orders on the way.

"I suspect it's just some mis-forecasting. It's going to be very difficult to tell if it's cycling down for a new model release, but as I've said publicly, the logical time to introduce a new model is in June, when they release the new firmware," he added. "It would be kind of crazy to launch a model now and then upgrade it again in June.'

Apple has previously noted that it will launch iPhone 2.0 in June, alongside a roll-out of third-party applications that will be available via iTunes.

Meanwhile, BlackBerry Busts Loose

Tom Krazit, posting on his One More Thing blog, noted that Research in Motion (RIM), the maker of the BlackBerry and related services, had a great fourth quarter financial report. The company pulled in US$1.9 billion over 2006's fourth quarter revenue of $930.4 million. It shipped 4.4 million smartphones during the quarter -- 14 million for the year -- and added 2.8 million subscribers to the BlackBerry service during the fourth quarter.

"This will be a trend worth watching in the second half of the calendar year, whether Apple's decision to add business-friendly features to the iPhone starts to make a dent in RIM's sales," Krazit wrote, noting that RIM also reported that it's started to make headway with consumers, expanding its market beyond its typical business customer.

"The truth is that Apple didn't even make a minor ding in Blackberry business -- sales and subscriptions exceeded expectations and guidance at every point of measurement," Tony Rizzo, research director of mobile software for The 451 Group, told MacNewsWorld.

"I'm always amused by anyone taking a 'black or white' or 'either/or' perspective -- there is still plenty of room for growth for all parties here. RIM will continue to completely dominate the enterprise and will continue to provide a broad range of telcos with a broad set of products on the consumer side," he explained, noting that "Apple fills a high-end hole, [and] RIM delivers an entire foundation."

More Models on the Way?

Regardless of supply-side questions, expectations run high that the iPhone line will branch off into multiple models, perhaps starting this year. Again, Piper Jaffray's Munster led the speculation with his thoughts on the matter, saying he believes Apple will have a family of iPhones by January 2009. He expects a pattern similar to Apple's iPod rollout, which has offerings of different form factors at different price points -- all of which leads to his prediction of 45 million iPhones in 2009.

"What would a lower price point iPhone look like, one wonders. There doesn't seem to be much in terms of features that could be taken out to reduce the price of manufacturing it and still have it be an attractive item to consumers," notes commenter malckwan on the AppleInsider post on the subject. "More likely, higher end features will be added to the line as a premium iPhone and the existing line bumps down the price point gradient with minor capacity increases at most," malckwan added.

While the inclusion of a mini iPhone "nano" to Apple's lineup has been bantered around for months, some posts aren't particularly friendly to Munster's sales predictions.

"Munster is out of his frickin' mind. Good thing I'm not paying for his 'analyses,'" noted SpamSandwich.

Apple Updates iTunes, QuickTime, and Front Row

Also this week, Apple slipped in new software updates for iTunes, QuickTime and Front Row, all of which provide bug fixes and/or security updates, though Apple wasn't clear on the details.

"Quicktime security issues hmmm could it be related to the recent hack. Guess we probably never know," noted commenter xUKHCx on the MacRumors.com post on the subject. He was referring to the MacBook Air hack at ComSecWest last week. The contest resulted in the delivery of the vulnerability to Apple, which would presumably patch it.