iPhone: The Device That Put Data To Work

19 years ago on 9 January 2007, Steve Jobs stood on a San Francisco stage and announced what would become one of the most consequential technological products of the 21st century: the Apple iPhone. Even in that moment of genius when Jobs said Apple was going to “reinvent the phone” it’s unlikely even he could have fully grasped the depth of transformation that lay ahead.

At the time, the original iPhone was a sleek yet modest device: a 3.5-inch touchscreen unit priced at $499/$599, sold in limited markets. Within its first 74 days on sale, Apple had hit one million units sold a feat that took the iPod nearly two years to achieve and by the end of 2008, Apple had passed 10 million iPhones sold in just its second calendar year.

An Apple iPhone surrounded by glowing fairy lights on a dark textured surface

Fast forward to today and the scale is almost unimaginable. There are well over 1.5 billion active iPhone users worldwide, Apple routinely ships over 220 million units a year, and iOS devices account for significant share of the global smartphone market.

What began as a niche, premium handset is now a cornerstone of how billions communicate, work, shop, learn and create.

The iPhone’s lasting impact in a technology-saturated world comes from more than its design or branding. Apple consistently put data to work by observing human behaviour, anticipating unmet needs and refining the experience over time. Through the integration of connectivity, intuitive interfaces, sensors and an adaptive ecosystem, the iPhone shaped new usage patterns and reset expectations of what a mobile device could do.

Similarly, in any organisation aiming to transform through data, the lesson isn’t about ownership of terabytes or bespoke models; it’s about integrating data into the decision experience so deeply that strategy, operations, and customer experience evolve with it. As well as launching a product, Jobs catalysed a new category of human-centred technology by listening to how people interact with information and designing systems around it.

Nearly two decades on, the iPhone’s legacy continues to grow because data was central to its evolution from novelty to necessity. In our own work with clients, when we talk about “putting data to work,” we mean embedding it with such clarity and purpose that it changes not just performance, but behaviour, instinct, and ultimately, identity.

Steve Jobs may have been five years ahead of the competition on that stage in 2007—but the deeper truth is that he was thinking in human data terms long before most of the world had even recognised what “mobile data” would mean. Today, that visionary perspective is essential for organisations that want to thrive in a data-driven future.