Next iPhone Model Could Hit Shelves in June 2009

Evidence is mounting that a next-generation iPhone is in the works and may be released this summer. Apple's Senior Vice President of Marketing, Phill Schiller, has verified that the annual product cycle for the iPhone is in June, as we all know from the initial release and upgrade to iPhone 3G. This alone is not enough, however.

Earlier reports of Apple's investment in a 3.6 percent stake in Imagination Technologies points to their interest in the company's development of a multi-core graphics processing unit (GPU). Coupled with the announcement last year that Apple acquired P.A. Semi to develop new chips for its mobile devices, it would seem that new hardware can't be far off.

Even further adding fuel to the speculation is a new device type appearing in web access logs and discovered in the USBDeviceConfuguration.plist file of the latest firmware. The device type "iPhone 1,1" refers to the first generation iPhone. The iPhone 3G is listed as "iPhone 1,2" and the new device type that has been discovered is "iPhone 2,1".

The iPod Touch recently went through a similar renaming with its new generation of hardware. Better graphics, more processing power and more storage space? Only time will tell what Apple has up its sleeve.