今春的大部分时间，苹果（Apple）的专项记者们争论不休，焦点集中在苹果预计今年9月份将发布的新一代iPhone究竟该如何命名。

    一些人称其为iPhone 5，这是为了与苹果在三周前发布的iOS 5操作系统相对应。

    另一些人则预计新iPhone并不是重新设计的新款iPhone，而是“加速版”iPhone 4，按照惯例应该叫iPhone 4S，就像苹果在两年前发布的iPhone 3GS一样。

    本周一早晨，德意志银行（Deutsche Bank）的克里斯•维特莫尔在报告中告诉客户，iPhone 5和iPhone 4S将可能同时发布。

    维特莫尔表示：“随着诺基亚（Nokia）和RIMM（黑莓手机生产商——译注）的消沉，苹果应抓住这一机会渗透中端智能手机市场（例如300至500美元价格区间），以显著拓展整个潜在市场（total addressable market）以及市场份额。”

    在维特莫尔看来，如果解锁版iPhone 4S定价在349美元左右，并配套预付费语音套餐，那么它将“显著提高（在潜在市场的）普及率”，这一市场目前已增长到拥有15亿潜在客户，分布在98个国家，其中三分之二的人偏好预付费套餐。

    在美国，大部分手机是由运营商补贴的，这些运营商通过与用户签约，从每月话费中收回手机成本。不过如上面的图表所示，世界上有很多地方，特别是在非洲、亚洲和拉丁美洲这些iPhone普及率不高的地方，用户倾向于预先支付手机的全部成本。

    值得注意的是，分析人士呼吁苹果发布成本较低的预付费版iPhone已有一段时间，而且维特莫尔在发表其“iPhone双款同步发行”理论时并未援引任何消息来源，也未声称自己掌握了什么内部情报。

    （然而，科技网站Loop的吉姆•达里姆普回忆称，今年早些时候，苹果首席运营官蒂姆•库克对研究机构Bernstein的托尼•萨克纳西透露，苹果“知道在预付费市场，价格是非常重要的因素”，虽然预付费市场似乎不是苹果的领域，但库克表示该公司“不会放弃任何市场”。）

    摩根士丹利（Morgan Stanley）的凯蒂•休伯蒂刚在台湾参加完一周的会议，上周日，她在另一份报告中指出，

    如果休伯蒂所认为的新款iPhone直到8月中下旬才投产，那么发布时间可能要拖到9月底。下图是休伯蒂的iPhone销量预测，她将200万部销量从第三季度移至第四季度（分别是苹果2011年第四财季和2012年第一财季）。她表示，如果新款iPhone能在9月初发布，她将把这200万部销量移回来。

    For much of the spring, the reporters who cover Apple (AAPL) have been arguing among themselves about what to call the new iPhone they expect the company to introduce in September.

    Some call it the iPhone 5, to match the iOS 5 operating system Apple unveiled to developers three weeks ago.

    Some, anticipating that the new device will be a speeded-up iPhone 4 rather than a major re-design, have been calling it the iPhone 4S, echoing the nomenclature Apple used two years ago when it introduced the iPhone 3GS.

    In a note issued early Monday, Deutsche Bank's Chris Whitmore is telling clients to expect both -- an iPhone 5 and an iPhone 4S.

    "With Nokia and RIMM struggling," he writes, "the time is right for Apple to aggressively penetrate the mid range smart-phone market (i.e. $300-500 category) to dramatically expand its [total addressable market] and market share."

    As Whitmore sees it, an iPhone 4S that is unlocked, priced around $349, and comes with a pre-paid voice plan would "drive significantly greater penetration" into an addressable market that has grown to include 1.5 billion potential customers in 98 countries, two thirds of whom prefer pre-paid plans.

    In the U.S., most cellphones are subsidized by carriers with contracts that allow them to recoup the cost of the phone in monthly payments. But as the above chart shows, there are large swaths of the world -- especially in Africa, Asia and Latin America, where iPhone penetration is low -- where customers prefer to pay the full cost of the phone upfront.

    Note that analysts for some time have been calling for Apple to release a lower cost, pre-paid iPhone, and that Whitmore does not cite any sources or claim any inside knowledge for his two-iPhone theory.

    [The Loop's Jim Dalrymple, however, recalls that COO Tim Cook told Bernstein's Toni Sacconaghi earlier this year that Apple "understood price is big factor in the prepaid market," and though the pre-paid market may seem out of Apple's realm, Cook said that the company was "not ceding any market."]

    In a separate note issued Sunday, Morgan Stanley's Katy Huberty, back from a week of meetings in Taiwan, reports that she expects iPhone and iPad production to "begin ramping up aggressively" from August through the end of the year.

    If production for what Huberty sees as one new iPhone doesn't start until in mid to late August, the launch might not come until late September. In her unit sales spreadsheet, copied below, she's shifted 2 million iPhones from calendar Q3 to calendar Q4 (Apple's fiscal Q4 and Q1 2012). If the launch comes in early September, she says, she'll shift them back.