The Evolution of The Smartphone

The Simon cost $900, a hefty price tag for a telephone in 1992. In the first six months, only 50,000 units were sold, obviously signaling that the Simon was not well received by the masses. It was heavy, had very poor battery life, was a memory hog, and wireless carriers were not prepared for the high amount of data transfers.

Marketed as being so simple that it could do anything, people found it wildly unnecessary and over the top. This is a keen example of how differently society viewed the presence of communication technology in their lives in the 1990's versus 2021.

The Simon included many of the beta-level features that are now commonplace in 2021 smartphones. However, the phone was very ahead of its time, which led to its immediate production downfall. That being said, the premise of the Simon provided a major launchpad for what would become the iPhone years later.

The BlackBerry 850 was introduced in 1999 as a personal communication device. It included email, fax, calendar, address book, and task lists as its primary features. It also featured a full QWERTY keyboard, allowing for streamlined typing. BlackBerry 850 did not include the ability to make calls, but that feature was offered in the BlackBerry 5810, released in 2002.

Because the first BlackBerry had no call feature, it was marketed as a personal communication device to the business world. Its target audience would use the BlackBerry to send emails and faxes and utilize the calendar for meetings. This was almost strictly professional-oriented with few fun/play features. In other words, it was the very first "work phone".

There was a marketing emphasis placed on the advanced security features included in the BlackBerry, which bolstered its reception from suits and other professionals. As smartphones continued to evolve over time, people became increasingly more and more comfortable with ceding their private information in exchange for more features and increased convenience. In 2021, privacy is often an afterthought for countless smartphone users.

In 2007, Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone to the world for the very first time, and global society has not been the same since. The iPhone still stands as by far the most disruptive addition to the smartphone and personal communications market ever. Pricing started at $499.

Apple sold over 270,000 first generation iPhones within the first two days of its release. Over 6 million iPhones were sold during its year-long time on the market. Given that it was an entirely new product with brand new technology, the iPhone was incredibly well-received by the masses. The huge sales numbers for a first generation device indicated a shift in the public sphere regarding personal technology.

The iPhone took many of the fundamental concepts of the Simon and tremendously amplified them. It allowed for talk, text, email, music, YouTube, navigation, weather, calendar, camera and photos, as well as internet web browsing. All of this was housed under the iconic glass touchscreen that covered the face of the phone. The iPhone was serviced with 2G cell service, which was comparable in strength to pre-high speed internet.

One of Apple's biggest selling points throughout the company's history has been their major emphasis on making the user experience as simple and straightforward as possible. The iPhone was easy to use and adaptable for people new to smartphones or BlackBerrys. The iPhone provided many of the items of a flip phone and combined it with a computer. People were drawn in by the ability to browse the web so effortlessly while on the go.

The first generation iPhone had no App Store, meaning the user was unable to add anything to the smartphone other than the factory setting functions. In 2021, this would appear primitive, but that widely satisfied the consumers of 2007. There were no devices in the market that provided an offering like this, let alone adding in a vast array of applications. A user would utilize the phone for communication purposes as well as web browsing, navigation, and camera, but nothing further was considered to be necessary or crucial to the user experience. This attitude began to shift as Apple continued to push the boundaries of the technological world.

In 2008, Apple released the iPhone 3G as the second generation iPhone. The iPhone 3G arguably made an even bigger splash than the original iPhone. The new iPhone provided all of the groundbreaking technology of the first generation model, while adding the ability to modify and personalize the functionality of the phone to the user's preferences. An App Store was added to allow third-party apps to be installed. This meant that the smartphone was no longer limited to factory defaults, putting power in the hands of the consumer.

The iPhone 3G sold over 1 million units in its opening weekend and, overall, sold over 15 million units during its production cycle. This was an explosion in sales over the already astounding sales figures of the first generation iPhone. The iPhone was clearly being rapidly accepted by consumers despite being a very new type of product. Smartphones were growing in popularity and were beginning to take hold of the personal communication market.

With the incredibly successful launch of the second iPhone and the addition of the App Store, competitors started circling. Google developed Android, an operating system to compete against iOS. The HTC Dream was launched in 2008 as a direct competitor to the iPhone. The HTC Dream was the first device to run the Android operating system. The Dream featured a sliding keyboard, a multi-touch screen, 3G and WiFi connection, and a slightly better camera than the iPhone 3G. Apple had clearly started something huge, as it threw cell phone makers into a frenzy as they attempted to catch up to the groundbreaking iPhone.

In addition to developing the Android operating system, Google also launched the Google Play Store. The Google Play Store was an app store designed to rival Apple's App Store. At launch in 2008, both app stores had roughly only 500 apps available; this number grew exponentially over time.

The invention of app stores and the apps themselves is a very significant milestone in the smartphone journey. The tremendous popularity of app stores among consumers indicated that people were beginning to use their smartphones for more than simply communicating with others; they were becoming lifestyle tools. Phones were transitioning from devices simply designed to talk and text into devices for a variety of functions, such as web browsing, gaming, music, navigation, news, and video entertainment. The year 2008 began the shift towards immense intrusion of the smartphone into the life of the consumer.

As of 2021, the App Store has 2.1 million apps and the Google Play Store has 3.1 million apps.

In 2012, Samsung launched the Galaxy S3. This phone had a sizably larger screen than its competitors (4.8 inches), and the market responded extremely well to the product. Samsung actually overtook Apple in smartphone sales with the release of the larger display.

The idea that people were wanting larger screens highlights the disruptive shift in consumer behavior. The request for larger screens supported the idea that customers were increasingly using their smartphones for much more than typical telephone uses. Consumers were using their devices to watch videos, read news, play games, etc., hence, they wanted more screen real estate for these functions.

In 2014, Apple responded to Samsung in the screen wars with the iPhone 6, which featured a 4.7-inch display and improvements all around from the previous generation. Apple also released the iPhone 6 Plus, which featured a 5.5-inch display for individuals seeking an even larger screen. Both models were huge hits, and smartphone displays have continued to increase in size.

People are reading the news on their smartphones instead of waiting for their hardcopy newspaper to arrive in the morning. A recent study showed that 86% of adults receive their news from a smartphone or mobile device. People are playing games, downloaded from app stores, on their phones instead of going to GameStop or playing board games. People are watching movies and TV shows on their phones instead of going to Blockbuster. All these shifts involve one common denominator: the smartphone.

People are becoming more and more dependent on their smartphones because they are using it as a concentrated location for various lifestyle components that were previously scattered. The smartphone has evolved from simply a phone or device and has become a tool for daily life.

Social media emerged around the time that the smartphone era was picking up speed. The first major contender, Facebook launched in 2004, three years before the launch of the iPhone. In 2006, Facebook had 5.5 million users; in 2007, there were 12 million; 2008, 20 million. There is no question that, as the smartphone grew in popularity, so did social media.

After the addition of the iPhone and app stores, countless social media platforms emerged to join Facebook in the sphere. The most notable and steadfast of these platforms were Instagram and Snapchat. As people continued to spend more and more time on their smartphones, they were pouring more of their time into social media. Fast forward to 2021, where smartphones and social media go almost hand-in-hand. The average user is on eight different social media platforms. The smartphone and social media have both drastically accelerated the extent to which the digital world influences the consumer.

In 2017, Apple broke the smartphone universe again with the release of the iPhone X. The iPhone X featured a full-screen display and no home button, once again answering the call for increased screen space. The most shocking addition to the smartphone was the facial recognition feature that would unlock the device and other functions. The iPhone X sold over 63 million units in its year-long run, blowing analyst predictions away.

The widely-praised feature of facial recognition highlights the tradeoffs that consumers are willing to make in order to streamline efficiency and embrace new technology. Apple previously used a fingerprint scanner for security, which raised initial concerns among privacy skeptics at release. Facial recognition takes the privacy concerns to a new level, bringing in fears of identity theft and government monitoring. This trend regarding handing over bodily data is only expected to grow in the years to come, with biometrics becoming more and more standard every day.

In 2019, Samsung released the Galaxy Fold. This smartphone was typically-sized from first look, but unfolded into a tablet-sized display that spans 7.3 inches. Using a plastic substance for the display, the screen can fold in half and be stored at smartphone standard size, but the device is also comparable to a tablet for consumers looking for a multi-faceted experience. The Galaxy Fold lineup has the largest "smartphone" screen space to date.

In 2021, there are over 3 billion smartphone users in the world. With all those phones in circulation that weren't there a little over a decade ago, there comes dramatic change in the way society operates. The world is stemming more and more from the internet every single day. When almost half the planet carries around a source of internet access in their pockets, this trend is only going to continue to pick up speed. The biggest industries on Earth revolve around technology that directly relates to your smartphone. And many once-prominent companies that failed to adapt to that shift have fallen into the abyss.

As of 2021, Apple stands as the world's most valuable company with a market capitalization of over $2.2 trillion. In 2014, that same crown was held by energy-producer ExxonMobile with a valuation of $432 billion. Almost all of the world's most valuable companies have a hand in the digital sphere: Amazon, Google, Apple, Facebook, Disney, Comcast, and the list goes on and on.

First went Blockbuster; next to go will be cable TV. Direct-to-consumer streaming services are popping up left and right by every major studio and network as they try to prepare themselves for the eventually death of cable television. More and more people are choosing to watch Netflix and Disney+ on their smartphones, on their own time, rather than tune into ABC on Thursdays at 8pm for their favorite show. This carries over into cable news as well, where there has been an uptick in people receiving their news from podcasts and other direct-to-consumer sources through their smartphones.

Social media has only become more and more prevalent in daily life. As of February 2021, Facebook has 2.8 billion active users, Instagram has 1.16 billion, and WeChat has 1.21 billion. TikTok has recently exploded in the social media realm as well, providing an alternative to YouTube in short video clips. In a recent study, 55% of adults receive some form of news from social media, and this statistic is only increasing. As the world continues to move more and more online, so do our lives.