The Wall Street Journal reported Friday evening that Apple’s (AAPL) next iPhone, widely believed to be named the ‘iPhone 5′, will work worldwide on the next-generation LTE wireless network.
Speaking to sources familiar with the situation, the Journal said that the iPhone 5 will be compatible with the fastest wireless networks around the world— including the U.S., Asia, and Europe.
One of disadvantages in terms of competitiveness of Apple’s current iPhone 4S is that it does not operate on 4G-cellular networking run by carriers like AT&T (T) and Verizon (VZ). The fact has given smartphone makers, including Apple’s main competitor and legal foe Samsung Electronics — the South Korean-based firm has begun offering LTE phones globally — a market share advantage that so far the iPhone maker has lacked.
While the iPhone 5 will sport 4G networking, allowing Apple to catch up to rival Samsung, it’s doubtful all carriers will be able to offer the network, the report said.
Apple shares hit new highs of $682.48 on 11.7M volume during Friday’s trading session in anticipation that the iPhone 5 will be introduced at a press event in San Francisco on Sept. 12. The shares have gained nearly 70% on a y/y basis.
Meanwhile, J.D. Power and Associates released Thursday their 2012 mobile and smart phone market study, giving Apple (AAPL) for the eighth consecutive year the highest score in smartphone customer satisfaction.
Apple achieved a score of 849 (on a 1,000-point scale) and “well” performance on all levels. J.D. Power and Associates particularly noted that Apple excels “in physical design and ease of operation.” HTC placed in second with a score of 790 followed by Samsung (782), Motorola (777), Nokia (763), LG (742), RIM Blackberry (740) and HP/Palm (707). LG ranked the highest in the firm’s “traditional mobile phone” study.
“As the capabilities of wireless phones and their applications continue to expand, allowing customers to more often use their device, handset manufacturers have an opportunity to shape the customer experience and impact satisfaction with better application integration and social networking options,” said Uma Jha, senior director of mobile devices at J.D. Power and Associates.
J.D. Power does the smartphone and traditional mobile phone satisfaction studies twice a year. The smartphone studies, which measure manufacturers in several key categories such as performance, physical design, features and ease of operation were based on experiences reported by 8,736 smartphone owners and 6,272 users of “traditional” mobile phones, said J.D. Power.
Both studies were fielded between January and June 2012.
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