An Apple job listing for a “Carrier Engineer” located near the Sprint headquarters in Kansas City, Missouri, has sparked speculation that Sprint could soon be the third U.S. carrier to adopt the iPhone.
Ever since we exclusively learned that Apple was planning to use near-field communications not just to enact mobile retail payments but to enable an “>ambitious remote computing service that will allow you to literally carry around your Mac on your iPhone, we’ve been excited to see NFC hit the iPhone.
But contrary to previous reports, don’t expect it this year. Apple’s plans for NFC are too ambitious to realize before 2012, according to a new report.
Conventional wisdom has held that the next iPhone won’t ship until September, at Apple’s annual iPod event. That’s three months later than Apple’s historic iPhone release cycles would suggest.
If the idea of waiting an extra three months for your next phone gets your blood boiling, though, it might get even worse: one report is now suggesting that the next iPhone won’t ship until November 21st.
What will the next iPhone be called? Rumors have recently pegged it as being christened the iPhone 4S when it debuts in September, but would Apple really signify that the next iPhone is really just a slight revision over the current model… right in the brand name?
I think they will. Here’s why.
Jefferies analyst Peter Misek has just coughed up a crusty old bezoar of regurgitated iPhone 5 rumors. You know pretty much all of them: that the next iPhone will be called the iPhone 4S (debatable, doubtful), that it’ll boast an A5 dual-core SoC (a certainty) and that it’ll be coming to Sprint and T-Mobile (maybe).
He does make one interesting new claim, though: the next iPhone will boast HSPA+ mobile broadband speeds. Depending on which carrier you believe, that might make it a 4G phone.