>But Apple executives, including Mr. Jobs, were seriously considering selling a less-expensive but similar phone as early as 2009, according to former executives involved in the plan. Then, the manufacturing teams were most opposed to it.
>Their concerns, which I previously reported on in the Wall Street Journal, were about manufacturing complexity: how could Apple build so many models with so many different components? Apple’s relatively simple supply chain had always been a big competitive advantage. Having relatively few products allowed it to focus, buy parts at scale and keep things secret.
http://jessicalessin.com/2013/09/10/what-really-held-up-the-...
What I want to say is, none of us, I suppose, were in the man's head, or worked at Cupertino. We can only speculate why there is a single iPhone/iPad. (And as you can read from the article, it may be due to operations and not because Jobs was so much about “simplicity“.)
Saying “Now that Steve is dead” contributes nothing to discussion unless you work at Apple and really know what you're talking about. (In which case your comments are very valuable.)