“Deutsche Telekom AG Chief Executive Officer Rene Obermann said Thursday the telecommunications operator has so far sold more than 100,000 iPhones in Germany,” Archibald Preuschat reports for Dow Jones Newswires.
“T- Mobile started selling the device in November 2007,” Preuschat reports.
“At the end of January, Deutsche Telekom said it had sold 70,000 iPhones in its home market,” Preuschat reports.
“Hamid Akhavan, Deutsche Telekom’s board member at T-Mobile, told Dow Jones Newswires earlier on the sidelines of a corporate event that the sales figures for the iPhone are ‘about in line” with the company’s internal targets,” Preuschat reports.
Full article here.
100,000 out of 80,000,000 mobiles (which isn’t even true, there are more mobiles than people in Germany) is a shitty number, especially if considered that the iPhone was sold simlock-free for a week and quite a few people unlocked it anyway, too.
But as long as their monthly tariffs are such a rip-off (nothing like in the US or UK) they’re not going to get more customers.
Yawn yawn – Europe is old news and boring and nobody cares – lets being on BRIC!! (Brazil russia india and china)
that’s 16.000 a month. that is a horrible number. and they even lowered the price to euro 99 (with the highest contract) one month ago. every time i pass by one of their shops i see an deserted iphone shelf. they don’t even advertise it anymore in their store-windows. what went wrong?
anyway: i am buying an unlocked 2nd generation iphone soon, yipee!
It appears that 70,000 sales in Germany is 100,000 in the US at the current Euro-dollar exchange rate.
So from the end of January to the end of May (almost) – 30,000 iPhones were sold in Germany.
30,000 in 4 months = 7,000+ per month
ARRRGGGH!!!
Germany has nearly 90,000,000 people. 1/3 the population of the U.S.
Imagine if the U.S. market for the iPhone was this bad!
And the Germans are usually such connoisseurs of hi-tech. Their Mac market share is one of the highest.
1. Germany has much closer to 80 mil than 90 mil in population
2. 3G networks are much more prevalent in Europe than in the US, so a phone that doesn’t run 3G isn’t going to sell in the mass quantities there as they do here.
3. Apple knew from the get go that the original iPhone wouldn’t be a huge hit (due to lack of 3G) in Europe, but big enough to make it worth while.
4. Apple is planning a HUGE rollout with their next version of the phone. 10 million units sold (not shipped) will be cake.
5. Decelerating sales happened in all the markets the iPhone was official introduced into, including the US, so no surprise that sales have tailed off (though it is by quite a large degree).
In Switzerland the three Carriers (Swisscom, Sunrise and Orange) say they have 40-45000 unlocked iPhones on their networks. Swiss population is about 8% of the German population. So the 100K sold in Germany is really a very bad result.
@Kevin
Kevin – you forgot to add 10 million for all the illegals in Germany.
No matter how you want to color over it Kevin, if the U.S. market sold as many as the German market, then since November the number of iPhones sold in the U.S. would be around 300,000.
Pathetic? No. Pathetic disaster? Yes!
The iPhone is a total flop in Germany. Apple has a big problem here and I am sure the next phone will come without the restrictions the current one has; i.e. the t-online contract.
Posts are right, its a disaster there. Someone needs to be taken out and shot.
Yeah, I have been saying for many months already that iPhone sales in Germany have been pathetic (rip-off prices, poor marketing, no 3G, can’t be purchased online, only sold in horrible T-punkt places – you’d have to be braindamaged to visit one of those ratholes)
It’s wierd that MDN never ever has a “take” when iPhone sales is shittier than expected. MDN didnt even try to answer the question “why?” when carriers in Europe decided to lower their iPhone prices, MDN just trashtalked something crap.
C’mon MDN let’s get some objectivity into your takes even when things don’t go as planned.
100k phones sold in Germany since November 2007, I mean WTF????? I refuse to believe that that is the correct figure, something smells really fishy here, like some error or sumthing like that.
iPhone=iFlop. Just wait until you see the recent US sales numbers. The excuse will be that they were out of stock and that it was planned.
Like Macs in the PC market, the iPhone will not be a game changer but rather will settle in as a small niche player in the cellphone market.
@Sukzdorf, MDN makes no pretense at objectivity. Whoever runs this site is/are fanboys through and through. They offer snide, poisonous comments at anyone who is not 110% pro Apple, and stay silent on anything where Apple has failed to perform. You’ll have to get used to it, I’m afraid.
@Marcos. You are not allowed to take people out and shoot them in Germany unless you have first lined them up against a wall.
adjustments/learning curve for AAPL. they will accomplish this with a 3G version and hopefully the carrier will also include a price cut.
“something smells really fishy here, like some error or sumthing like that.”
What’s fishy is you believing Apple would make a dent in the European market with an under-featured, overpriced 2G phone.
I’ve never seen an iPhone here in Berlin.
The Germans aren’t stupid!
The price of the iPhone is too high and the price of the contracts are even higher.
most people don’t remember that the first few blackberrys were crap. Now they are taken for granted. Apple’s first phone rocked the mobile world and every one is still trying to catch up. Can’t complain for v1.0.