Reuters news agency suggested that Apple is in talks with Chinese mobile operators, claiming the handset could be launched within weeks.
To this point, Apple has targeted the premium end of the smartphone market - but that seems about to change.
Some analysts, though, are sceptical about claims of an "emerging markets" version.
"It is more likely that Apple will price down its existing model when it releases its next flagship product," Ben Wood, an analyst with CCS Insight, commented.
Reuters explained that the lower specification model would boast 8GB of internal storage, rather than the 16GB or 32GB on the current iPhone 4.
In other industry news, Michael Morgan, senior analyst for mobile devices at ABI Research, has suggested that Android's share of the smartphone market has increased once again, rising to 47 per cent of worldwide smartphone sales in the second quarter of 2011.
Posted by Andre Dixon
