Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu is claiming that suppliers have confirmed that a key feature of the next generation iPhone will be support for China Mobile’s TD-SCDMA 3G network.
This is huge because, with a whopping 650 million customers, China Mobile is the world’s largest cell provider by a large margin. And while customers may be clamoring for a 4G iPhone in the US, Wu states that, although 4G LTE tests are underway in China, it’ll still be at least two year before LTE is a widely adopted technology there.
Of course, with all the China-specific improvements in iOS 6 that Apple announced at WWDC earlier this month, this news doesn’t come as much of a surprise.
Interestingly enough, Wu also went on to talk briefly about some of the new aspects of the sixth generation iPhone. If Wu’s information is correct, we should expect to see a new form factor, a slightly larger screen, and a 4G LTE wireless modem. Of these new features, Wu said:
“We believe these new features will likely help drive a significant upgrade and new user cycle more powerful than what we saw with the iPhone 4 and 4S.”
The iPhone 5 is reportedly launching some time in October, and I can’t wait to get my hands on it. Other than these three much-talked about hardware changes as well as support for China Mobile, what improvements or new features do you hope to see in the next iPhone? Sound off in the comments below
