WWDC 2012: What Will Apple Unveil?

It looks like Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) is preparing to focus on software rather than hardware releases at its Worldwide Developers Conference, announced for June 11 to 15 in San Francisco. The announcement, coming a day after the company revealed another great quarterly performance, said the summer event would let developers “learn about the future of iOS and OS X.”

“We have a great WWDC planned this year and can’t wait to share the latest news about iOS and OS X Mountain Lion with developers,” Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, said in the statement.

Apple has a history of launching new hardware at the WWDC, having unveiled the iPhone 3G in 2008, the iPhone 3GS in 2009, and the iPhone 4 in 2010. However, the iPhone 4S came out at a separate October event last year, and indications are that the company might take the latter route with its next smartphone version, too.

The five-day developers’ conference, at the Moscone West in San Francisco, will have technical sessions aimed at app developers, hands-on labs with coding assistance, and insights into development techniques, as well as events to award the best iPhone, iPad, and Mac apps.

Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) developer event is scheduled to be held at the same venue a couple of weeks later, and may also see an update to the company’s Android mobile operating system. Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) is holding its BlackBerry World event from May 1 to 3.