一個時代可能即將終結。

iPhone橫空出世革新手機行業已近10年，現在的問題是智能手機是否已經進化到極限，因為就連蘋果公司都把4英尺小屏幕的老款手機拿出來當新品炒。

行業專家相信，智能手機的創新已經不再局限于掌上設備本身，而是各種各樣的新設備上作為軟件或服務出現的手機功能，從智能汽車、智能冰箱、智能手表到智能首飾等等創新節奏都在加快。

分析師和產品設計師指出，就屏幕尺寸、電池壽命和網絡容量而言，目前智能手機硬件已經接近承受極限，很難再有新突破。

克里斯蒂安?林德霍爾姆曾發明老式諾基亞手機上的快捷輸入鍵盤，這項發明讓諾基亞手機成為歷史上最暢銷的移動設備。林德霍爾姆說：“現在手機領域的所有改進都是漸進的，稍微快一點兒，稍微大一點兒，存儲空間稍微多一點兒，或者分辨率稍微高一點兒。”

這牽涉到大量經濟利益，因為去年底世界上最大的三家上市公司——蘋果、谷歌和微軟的未來可能會取決于誰能率先實現突破淘汰手機。

許多公司都在探索新的互動方式，幫助消費者通過觸覺、視覺和聽覺與外界溝通。

方法之一就是通過聲音激活個人助理設備，比如嵌入微型麥克風的“智能”項鏈以及可按照語音命令工作的微型耳塞。

全球的頂尖科技公司都在智能設備領域進展迅速，Google Now、蘋果Siri、微軟的Cortana和亞馬遜的Alexa現在都能為用戶閱讀文字或電子郵件，回答實際問題，操作手機，進行基本通信或者查找地圖。

獨立金融分析師理查德?溫莎認為：“就總的發展趨勢來說，智能設備正在成為連接用戶數字生活的新渠道。”

林德霍爾姆經營的公司叫KoruLab，主要為可穿戴設備開發簡潔但極為高效的軟件。在他看來，智能手機的功能有兩類，一類屬于能提供豐富娛樂體驗的大尺寸產品，另一類則屬于更注重實際生活的小型可穿戴設備，比如日程提醒，健康水平監測以及購買商品或服務等。

瑞銀金融分析師估算，今年智能手機廠商的收入將超過3230億美元，同比下降1.4%。研究機構Strategy Analytics預計，蘋果一家就會占據50%以上的收入和75%以上的利潤。

為扭轉iPhone銷量下滑的趨勢，蘋果最新推出了一系列新產品，包括更便宜的4英寸iPhone SE。

谷歌的收入幾乎全部來自各類網絡服務中的廣告，而不是安卓系統，盡管世界上約80%的手機都在使用這個系統。

谷歌對移動廣告的收入規模諱莫如深。但分析師估算，2015年谷歌披露的750億美元收入中，約四分之一到三分之一來自移動廣告。

微軟收購諾基亞手機業務后毫無建樹，還損失了76億美元，去年微軟已全面撤出手機市場。微軟的策略正逐漸轉向出售云服務，通過后臺移動軟件賺錢，目前云服務已經成為微軟增長最快的業務。

手機就像電子時代的瑞士軍刀，但它們最吸引人之處已經從搶眼的閃亮屏幕和光滑的邊角變成了其中運行的軟件和服務，而且往往是存儲在云端的聯網服務。

鮑勃?奧唐納是加州福斯特城咨詢公司Technalysis Research的消費電子行業分析師兼總裁。他說：“移動網絡正逐漸將所有設備連結起來。”

無論將來哪個平臺可能取代手機，都需要解決電池續航這個無法擺脫的問題。隨著消費者看視頻越來越多，增加待機時間也變得越發急迫。

下一代設備還需要更加柔軟而且能在不同亮度下工作的屏幕。幾十年來，移動設備的狂熱粉絲們一直在急切盼望，但多年來三星和LG等知名行業龍頭一直無法實現平價量產可彎曲屏幕。

理查德?溫莎認為，可折疊或者平鋪時可達10英尺甚至14英尺的柔軟屏幕將使手機突破屏幕尺寸的概念。他說：“平板電腦是什么？為什么還要用平板？平板電腦市場可能會在一夜之間就消失了。”（財富中文網）

譯者：Charlie

審校：夏林

It could be the end of an era.

Nearly a decade after the iPhone broke the mold for mobile phones the question is now being asked whether the evolution of the smartphone has finally come to an end as even Apple now treats older, smaller 4-inch screens as something new.

Industry experts believe innovation in smartphones is giving way to phone functions popping up as software or services in all manner of new devices from cars to fridges to watches and jewelry rather than remaining with handheld devices.

And analysts and product designers said fresh breakthroughs are running up against the practical limits of what’s possible in current smartphone hardware in terms of screen size, battery life and network capacity.

“Everything in the phone industry now is incremental: slightly faster, slightly bigger, slightly more storage or better resolution,” said Christian Lindholm, inventor of the easy text-messaging keyboards in old Nokia phones that made them the best-selling mobile devices of all time.

The financial stakes are high as the futures of Apple AAPL 0.70% , Google GOOGL -0.28% , and Microsoft MSFT 0.48% , the world’s three biggest listed companies at the end of last year, may now turn on who gets the jump on making handsets redundant.

Many firms are experimenting with new ways to help consumers interact with the wider world through touch, sight and sound.

These include voice-activated personal assistant devices dangling from “smart jewelry” necklaces with tiny embedded microphones or tiny earpieces that get things done for us based on our verbal commands.

The world’s biggest tech companies have made real progress in this arena with Google Now, Apple Siri, Microsoft Cortana and Amazon.com‘s AMZN 1.18% Alexa now able to read texts or emails for users, answer practical questions, control phone features, handle basic communications or read a map.

“The way the whole thing is evolving, the device itself is becoming just another way to provide access to a user’s digital life,” said independent financial analyst Richard Windsor.

Lindholm now runs KoruLab, developers of compact, ultra-efficient software for running wearable devices. He sees smartphone functions splitting into two camps—big-screen devices for rich entertainment and compact wearables for more transactional activities like keeping up with one’s calendar, health or fitness monitoring or paying for goods or services.

Financial analysts at UBS UBS -0.65% estimate smartphone makers will generate more than $323 billion in revenue this year, a 1.4% decline from last year. Apple alone took in half of that revenue and more than three quarters of all profits, according to research firm Strategy Analytics.

Seeking to reverse declining iPhone sales, Apple announced a range of new products including a cheaper 4-inch screen iPhone SE.

Google generates virtually all of its revenue from advertising sold alongside its wide variety of Web services, rather than from its Android software, which drives roughly 80% of the world’s phones.

It is cagey about how much revenue comes from mobile advertising, but analysts estimate this contributed roughly a quarter to a third of its $75 billion revenue reported in 2015.

Last year Microsoft pulled back from the handset business, writing off $7.6 billion for its fruitless acquisition of Nokia’s handset business. Increasingly, its strategy has become to make money off the back-end of mobile software, through selling cloud-based services, now its fastest growing business.

For while phones are now the Swiss Army knives of the electronic age, their essential appeal to consumers has shifted from their eye-catching shiny screens and sleek bevelled edges to the apps and services running on the phones, often as Internet-based services hosted in the cloud.

“Mobile networks are moving to connect to all these other devices,” said Bob O’Donnell, a consumer electronics analyst and president of Technalysis Research in Foster City, Calif.

Whatever platform might displace the handheld phone also will need to resolve nagging questions about battery life, which have become more pressing as consumers watch more and more video.

The next big device also needs more flexible screenscapable of working in different lighting conditions. That’s a decades-old dream of gadget enthusiasts that has eluded recognized market leaders Samsung SSNLF -2.44% and LG of Korea, which have struggled for years to mass-produce flexible screens at anything close to mass-market prices.

Richard Windsor said flexible displays that could be unfolded or unrolled to up to 10 or 14 inches would set phones free from being defined by screen size. “What is a tablet computer?” Windsor asks. “Why would you bother having a tablet? That market would just evaporate overnight,” he said.