A SIM-less network will have to developed sooner or later. If we are to connect n * 10 billion devices to the mobile network the amount of gold used for the SIM

A SIM-less network will have to developed sooner or later. If we are to connect n * 10 billion devices to the mobile network the amount of gold used for the SIM cards will become an issue. So removing the need for a SIM, and thus the gold used, will be neccessity. But most likely this will be driven through the "normal" standardization committees (3GPP etc) instead of coming from Apple.