Analyst Predicts New iPhone In June

If the cost of the iPhone and its corresponding service plan has deterred you from purchasing Apple's popular phone, you'll like this. Katy Huberty, a prominent analyst with Morgan Stanley, expects Apple to introduce a new iPhone in June that will be more economically friendly to its customers.

Huberty claims the cost of the iPhone hardware is the biggest barrier to greater iPhone adoption. The service plan is also a large barrier that's deterring adoption. In addition to her predictions that a new iPhone will have a lower total cost of ownership, Huberty is also claiming the new iPhone could include gesture-based functionality. "We expect Apple to launch new iPhones in June that offer both a lower total cost of ownership and new functionality, potentially including gesture-based technology," she wrote in a note to investors.



As you'll recall, Apple dropped the price on the iPhone 3G to $99 when it introduced the iPhone 3GS in 2009. However even with this lower price, the higher end (and more expensive) iPhone 3GS was still more popular among consumers.

The iPhone isn't the only Apple product that has people talking. Huberty also has a few predictions regarding Apple's iPad. More specifically, Huberty expects Apple to ship 6 million devices in the 2010 calendar year. This is significantly higher than Wall Street's average projections of 3 million to 4 million.

"We expect Apple to ship its first iPad and announce additional content deals in late March to better than expected demand," Huberty wrote. "We see the iPad targeting the sub-$800 consumer notebook market which equates to 30M annual units just in the US (120M globally)."