The most astonishing fact about new iPhone is HOW Apple managed to keep secret for nearly two-and-a-half years of development while working with partners, such as Google, Cingular and Yahoo.

The iPhone, which won't be available in the United States until June, represents a close development partnership with America's largest wireless phone company (Cingular), the world's largest e-mail service Yahoo, and the world's dominant search company. Although speculation was rampant before the introduction that Apple would introduce a phone with iPod capabilities, actual details of the device were scarce. Even some senior Apple managers whispered during the keynote that they were seeing the iPhone for the first time, along with the 4,000 other Apple followers who crammed the Moscone meeting center here. Indeed, Apple's emphasis on secrecy may have influenced Apple's choice of Cingular to be the exclusive provider for iPhone service in the United States.

Apple, legendary for the ferocity with which it safeguards new product announcements, had extraordinary challenges in keeping the iPhone under wraps for 30 months. Besides involving Cingular, Google and Yahoo, not to mention the unnamed Asian manufacturer, the project touched nearly every department within Apple itself, Jobs said, more so than in any previous Apple creation.

Apple does make it clear to employees and business partners that they will be dismissed and possibly prosecuted for leaking company secrets. Apple has also played the bully role, suing bloggers and other independent journalists for posting purported advance information about unannounced Apple products.

Secrets - along with patents - protect Apple against competitive threats from foreign companies that have become expert at instant cloning of Apple's products and designs. But secrets also create a major buzz factor. As the giant Consumer Electronics Show opened this week in Las Vegas, where hundreds of the world's biggest gadget and gizmo companies show off their newest and greatest gear, everyone was talking about the company that was not there - Apple - and speculating on what Steve Jobs had up the sleeves of his trademark black mock turtleneck shirt.

Phil Schiller, Apple's head of marketing and one of the few Apple executives involved with the project from the start, said he had to keep the iPhone development secret even from his wife and children. When he left home for the official unveiling yesterday, Schiller said, his son asked, "Dad, can you finally tell us now what you've been working on?" Jobs paused during the keynote to acknowledge the strain and sacrifices that the past months have brought not just for the employees who kept the secrets so well, but also for their families. "We couldn't have done it without you," he said, with obvious sincerity.