When Steve Jobs announced the iPhone last year, he claimed that he wanted to snaffle 1% of the global market share with the device, a considerable feat, even for an established computing giant like Apple.
But according to an Apple insider (who wishes to remain anonymous), Jobs’ 1% percent projection was merely the beginning. Apparently, Apple is set to allow third-party mobile manufacturers to license the iPhone/iPod touch OS for use on non-Apple handsets. Talk about dropping a bomb on the industry.
Understandably Apple wants to keep this one quiet for the time being and we are guessing that the WWDC 08 in June, which incidentally Apple has already claimed will be a landmark event for the company, will be the launching pad for the untethered iPhone/iPod touch OS.
Our insider tells us that Apple is wary of competition from the likes of Android, Linux based OS’s and the ever more prominent Windows Mobile and wants to make sure that it can compete in the mobile industry without relying solely on impressive hardware. Our insider also told us that Jobs is fed up of seeing his iPhone interface being aped on other touch-screen devices and wants to put a stop to it by using the iPhone OS as a catalyst.
The move, if true would mark something of a sea change for Apple, which though it does create very well regarded software, has always been a device company first. Even so, if Microsoft, a software company, can move into the device market with the Zune and the Xbox, then there is no reason why Apple can’t move more aggressively into software and picking the mobile industry as the stage for such an assault would be a very smart decision.
Indeed, our source claims that Sony Ericsson, Samsung and Blackberry have all expressed an interest in the iPhone OS - maybe we will be getting a 3G iPhone sooner than we think (albeit wearing a different outfit than we were expecting).
April fool?
Fair cop, you got us