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Breaking: iPhone SDK Event On March 6

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on February 27

sdkinvite.jpgJust got an email from Apple PR. The company is going to announce its plans on the iPhone SDK at the Apple campus on March 6.

The email invitation says: “Please join us to learn about the iPhone software roadmap, including the iPhone SDK and some exciting new enterprise features.” Those enterprise features probably involve some level of support for Microsoft Exchange above and beyond simple IMAP support, which has been the one big feature requested since Day one. I’ll be curious to see what else in the enterprise category that Apple has on tap.

The news has given Apple stock a little boost. After opening 91 cents lower from Tuesday’s close, AAPL is trading up $2.78 or more than 2%. It’s nice to see little green numbers next to the quote instead of red ones for the first time in a few days.

So is it late? Technically, but just a little. And it’s still not clear exactly what Apple’s going to say about the SDK and precisely when and how the SDK is going to get into the hands of all those would-be iPhone developers. Also important will be the hoops they’re going to have to jump through. What’s generally been expected is that Apple’s going to require developers to digitally sign their applications is a protection against security concerns. Remember what CEO Steve Jobs said in his “Hot News” statement on the matter last year: “It will take until February to release an SDK because we’re trying to do two diametrically opposed things at once—provide an advanced and open platform to developers while at the same time protect iPhone users from viruses, malware, privacy attacks, etc. This is no easy task.”

Well at least now we know what’s going to be topic A next week. Let the speculation commence.

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Reader Comments

Tommo_UK

February 27, 2008 01:39 PM

Reposting this from my blog:
The market still fails to grasp the significance of this event, but they WILL understand it after the launch, and after the demos and announcements. It will be all over the media.
I firmly believe this is going to have a material impact on the stock in a big way, as projections for iPhone and touch sales will be ramped up now that the Street begins to understand how large the addressable market for the devices really are, not to mention sees for itself the massive interest from large major software development houses in the platform.

It will also see the potential for revenues from software sales through iTunes, which I am sure will be the sole conduit for purchasing and installing applications.
The launch may have been delayed to allow one or two developers to finish their demo products of for the launch.. maybe Lotus Notes, or Exchange, or whatever... needed a bit more work before they could be shown and that's why the push-back was so last-minute, because they hoped to get the m finished in time but ultimately couldn't quite do it.
This is huge. This is about 20-30M combinediPhones/iPod touch owners per year for application developers to sell applications to. Massive - simply MASSIVE addressable market.

One of the biggest things to ever happen at Apple, and basically it has been totally overlooked not just by the Street, but even by most of the Apple usuals.

This is bigger than going from OS9 to OS X of PPC to Intel.

And nobody gets it.

Amazing. Morons.

Magnus

February 27, 2008 01:44 PM

Cool, now if we could only get the iPhone too in the Middle East ;-)

Jack

February 27, 2008 06:32 PM

Just wanted to thank you for all your negative stories on Apple. Allowed me to buy a lot of stock at 116. You see, all the idiot bloggers like you and Wall Street analysts like Toni Succoneggi make it easy for true investors like me. We understand what a unique and innovative company Apple is. And the huge growth potential that lies ahead. Here is a prediction for you. Within 2 years, the market cap of AAPL will exceed that of MSFT. Print this if you have the courage. Otherwise, you are just a coward hiding behind you ability to censor the comments.

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A blog on the daily doings of Apple and the many companies in its orbit, with insight and analysis by two longtime Apple-watchers BusinessWeek Senior Writer Peter Burrows and BusinessWeek.com Senior Technology Writer Arik Hesseldahl.

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