For once, Apple will play catch-up when it announces early tomorrow morning Australian time what is expected to be a new iPhone.
The company is returning to the Yerba Buena Centre for the Arts in San Francisco to launch a new iPhone, the first major generational shift to the device since the iPhone 4 launched in June 2010, if one regards the iPhone 4S as an incremental change.
While Apple no doubt will reveal some features that are ahead of the competition, and in some areas even blitz it, much has changed in two years in the smartphone market -- changes it must address to keep abreast of Android competition.
Smartphone screens are bigger and Apple is expected to replace the 3.4-inch screen of the iPhone 4S with one about 4-inches diagonally, adopting a 16:9 aspect ratio. The new iPhone is therefore expected to be longer, but not much wider than current models.
The degree to which it increases the current 960 x 640 pixel resolution or compromises the 326 pixel-per-inch "retina display" will be a juggling act, as Apple will be forced to increase battery capacity to cope with a higher-resolution screen.
A larger battery also will be needed should the iPhone, as is hotly tipped, work on fourth-generation (4G) LTE networks in Australia. In particular, Apple's 4G will have to work on the 1800 megahertz frequency used by Telstra and Optus -- its current 4G-capable iPad does not.
The power-juggling act will also decide whether the new iPhone is driven by a fast, A6 quad core processor instead of the slowish 800 MHz dual core Apple A5 processor on the iPhone 4S.
The money is against a new iPhone having an embedded near field communication (NFC) chip, which would let the iPhone be used for swipe-and-go payments at retail outlets.
Several Android models and recent Blackberry handsets have NFC, but a lack of suitable terminals, differences in NFC implementation and Apple's general caution suggests the new iPhone probably won't -- but nothing is certain.
In a move that will annoy users, Apple is expected to shrink its 30-pin dock connector to make more room for components inside the chassis, thereby making it incompatible with existing iPhone docks without an additional connector.
Equally inconvenient is the apparent move to a third generation of SIM cards, an even smaller sized "nano-SIM" compared to the micro-SIM used in the iPhone 4 and new iPad.
The company also is expected to announce the release of its new iOS 6 mobile operating system, and the star of the show is its Passport App.
It lets users store digital versions of membership cards, airline boarding passes and cinema tickets, is already being implemented by the likes of Virgin Australia and is competition for Google Wallet.
Apple's decision to dump Google Maps and implement its own 3D Maps may work or backfire, with Google now offering turn-by-turn navigation for cyclists and local transport timetabling in Australia.
Gone, too, will be the YouTube app as part of the iOS standard furniture, but YouTube yesterday announced the release of its own replacement app for the iTunes store.
Apple's personal assistant Siri voice recognition system will receive a makeover with additional services such as tweeting by voice, restaurant reservations, and US sports results, and be extended to the new iPad.
But there is no indication whether Siri will be more usable in Australia and how many of these new services will work here.
Currently Siri tells Australian users it "can only look for businesses, maps and traffic in the United States'', an unhappy situation noted by Stephen Wolfram during a recent Australian visit.
His Wolfram Alpha engine already provides many of Siri's responses, but isn't fully implemented here by Apple.
Siri proved a mixed blessing for Apple. Siri and its voice-recognition capability was the most highly promoted feature of the iPhone 4S last year, yet its most abandoned here.
A survey by The Australian earlier this year found that a majority of iPhone 4S users had stopped using it.
The new iOS6 also includes a "remind me'' option which can be selected instead of accepting a call. You will then be reminded to call back after a designated time. There's Facetime over 3G and not just WiFi, Facebook integration, a VIP accounts feature for email and a long overdue upgrade to the alarm app.
Apple also is expected to drop production of the iPhone 3GS and release an updated iPhone Touch.
Mobile device research company Telsyte said there were an estimated 4.5 million iPhones in Australia at the end of June this year.
Telsyte research director Foad Fadaghi said iPhone 3GS users and early buyers of iPhone 4 would be out of contract and prime candidates to upgrade.
"We know before the (iPhone) 4S was released 80 per cent of iPhone users intended to purchase a new model."
Mr Fadaghi said Apple faced a challenge in creating the same "wow factor'' that surrounded the original iPhone's release in 2007.
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