Shortages. Poor yields. And massive queues – these are just a few of the issues tipped to affect the iPhone 5S' September 20 release date, according to retail sources.
High demand usually means delays, and that's always the case with a new iPhone. But this time the wait is expected to be even longer on account of the new colour schemes and fingerprint scanner.
Gotta Be Mobile reports: "a third party retailer and a corporate carrier warned us the iPhone 5s stock will be limited on the release date and the addition of the Gold iPhone 5s could mean that there is less depth to the stock on hand."
In a note to investors, Jeffries & Co analyst Peter Misek said Apple would build five to ten million iPhone 5S handsets this quarter. Misek also pointed out that yields of the iPhone 5S' fingerprint scanner have been terrible – something that could have dire consequences for consumers.
This is, perhaps, to be expected, however, as historically Apple has put its flagship handsets up for pre-order straight away after its announcements, chalking up record sales in the process. This time, in a somewhat startling move, there have only been pre-orders on the iPhone 5C.
Apple sold five million iPhone 5 units during the handset's opening weekend last year -not as big an increase on the iPhone 4S's opening weekend as many industry types expected - but sell-side analysts expect the iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C to do just as well. The iPhone 5S goes on sale on September 20, and anyone looking at getting one from Apple should expect queues.
Our advice? Let the hysteria die down – give it a week or two – and then head on down to your local retailer and/or Apple Store to pick one up. No one likes queuing, after all.
Apple is tipped to shift 81 million iPhones in the second half of 2013, an increase of 9 percent year-on-year, according to Forbes.
iPhone 5S & iPhone 5C demand "truly phenomenal"
Never before has Apple released two iPhone handsets at the same time. So that's a first – and it's also the first time we've seen the company target lower aspects of the market with a cheaper variant of its classic smartphone.
We say cheap – but the iPhone 5C is hardly cost-effective. The handset costs £469 SIM-free but it is available for free on a variety of contracts, which you can read more about here.
The iPhone 5S, on the other hand, is a more traditional Apple smartphone. Yes, it's only an incremental update but it does add in a raft of improvements that Apple says will dramatically alter how the phone performs.
The most notable of which is the introduction of Apple's 64-bit A7 chipset and M7 co-processor. Apple says this new silicon offers around 40 times more performance than its first iPhone, and around double that of the iPhone 5.
"The demand for the new iPhone 5c and 5s has been truly phenomenal in the first few days of pre-registration. We have already seen double digit growth in pre-registrations compared to the same period for iPhone 5 last year, and with the exceptional rate in which we are receiving these, we are predicting that the new handsets will set a record as generating the most pre-registrations ever at Phones 4u," said Scott Hooton, Chief Commercial Officer at Phones 4u.
He added: "To date, this interest has also shown that 75 per cent are intending to purchase the new iPhone 5c or 5s on 4G, so not only are we expecting pre-orders of the iPhone 5c to go through the roof this weekend, we are gearing up for an exceptionally busy launch day on 20th September, when both officially go on-sale at Phones 4u stores across the country and online."
Thinking of making the jump to Apple's ecosystem? Check out our hub pieces of the new iPhone and iOS 7 below, as well as what two fanboys – one Android; the other Apple – made of the launch:
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