September 12 is shaping up to be one of the biggest days in wireless this year.
According to a new report from the Wall Street Journal, Apple is planning to launch its new flagship iPhone 8 smartphone in San Francisco that day. Though the company has used the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for its last two iPhone reveals, the Journal reports Apple is hoping to hold this year’s event in the Steve Jobs Theater on its campus outside the city if construction wraps up in time.
But that date will also mark the start of the inaugural Mobile World Congress America’s show, which will be held in the Moscone Center in the heart of San Francisco. The show is the new incarnation of CTIA’s Super Mobility conference, formerly the largest stateside event for the wireless industry. GSMA, which runs the massive Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona every year, teamed up with CTIA last year on plans to breathe new life into the event.
This won’t be the first time these two particular wireless industry highlights overlap. Apple last year timed its iPhone 7 launch to coincide with the start of Super Mobility 2016, which was held in Las Vegas.
Predictions for the iPhone 8 run the gamut, with forecasters expecting a full-screen display, new fingerprint sensor and other biometric options, new memory tiers with a 512 GB high-end option, and a massive price tag around $1,000.
On the latter front, a recent survey from Fluent indicated loyalty among Apple’s user base will keep customers interested despite the cost. Though 67 percent of iPhone consumers said a $1,000 price tag is too high, 70 percent of users also said they wouldn’t consider a different phone.
And it seems Apple is banking on this. The company released guidance for its fiscal fourth quarter (the third calendar quarter) expecting revenues of between $49 billion and $52 billion.
Rosenblatt Analyst Jun Zhang forecasted production volumes of the iPhone 8 will reach between 35 million and 40 million in the second half of this year.
