Why 2 new iPhones may not become golden cash cows

iPhone 5S and 5C facing hurdles.

"The lower-end iPhone is to address price competition in an increasingly commoditizing market, but the likes of Lenovo and ZTE achieve sufficient quality at much lower cost," said Ronald Klingebiel, Assistant Professor of Strategy at Warwick Business School, in a comment after Apple announced its new iPhone 5S and 5C models.

"At the upper end, the business model is about to change. There is a chance that the majority of value capture, which had migrated from the handset to the combination of OS and app store, will move on to apps themselves, reducing the cut for middle men," Klingebiel added.

The professor also said there is also a threat from new entrants "to prise open the tight lock between handsets, operating systems, and app stores" citing how Sailfish, Ubuntu, Firefox, and even Tizen are offering next-generation operating systems that support the trend towards interoperable html-based apps.

"This could lead to an unbundling of the industry value chain and reduce Apple’s possibility to extract value from the iOS-app store nexus," said Klingebiel.