“And while Apple is getting a very sweet deal from AT&T in the form of huge payments for each iPhone sold, which is pulling in billions of dollars in revenues each quarter for the company, the relationship is also the subject of much discontent. Obviously, plenty of users are fed up with AT&T complete and utter failure at times to provide a network that will support the iPhone. But word is that Apple has also not been a happy camper for some time now, as what many perceive to be greatest source of weakness for the iPhone, AT&T’s network, is something that is completely out of their control,” Siegler writes. “The big question for 2010 is: Is Apple finally ready to do something about it?”
Siegler writes, “A few signs are starting to suggest that the planets may be aligning… [that] will in fact lead to a Verizon iPhone this coming summer.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “grh” for the heads up.]
I don’t think Apple needs to go to Verizon at all. It’s not like they are having trouble selling iPhones. The only reason to jump to Verizon is if the iPhone wasn’t selling.
As a Verizon customer, I sincerely doubt that either Apple or Verizon will change their business model for the other. Which is what would have to happen for Apple to go to Verizon.
Still… stranger things have happened.
Jtc;
I was referring to the help desk personnel, who would be forced to handle a huge deluge of calls about their network crashing with fewer than half the phone people needed to handle the calls.
Can you imagine ATT network issues combined with a Google style failure of help desk assistance?
T-Mobile please!!
From the 3G iPhone owner I met in the grocery store checkout lane, that I had to ask how crappy the AT&T;service is here in Norfolk/Virginia Beach, Virginia area…
He’s got NO COMPLAINTS with AT&T;service in Virginia (Eastern Seaboard)!
Compared with the other ‘shout outs’ of pleased AT&T;users here at MDN, seems like Luke Wilson can add a few more postcards to his repertoire!
And WTH are all those semicolons doing in my post. I didn’t type them?! MDN can you please explain??
If Apple will make money with a CDMA phone then I say go for it. Apple are in a great position now to release the phone to all networks that can handle it. It has the same appeal as the iPod and if available universally then a lot of people will buy it.
I have to agree with the other comments about 2012, and LTE being prerequisites for the iPhone on Verizon. The Qualcomm CMDA2000/UMTS/LTE chip isn’t scheduled to be available until the second half of this year, so that knocks that out for the January announcement. No way to get those chips in quantity until a lot later this year.
With iPhones selling very well here in the US, there doesn’t seem to be a big reason for Apple to make a CDMA2000-only especially since it is a dying cellular technology. Apple is smarter than that.
Service crappy in Norfolk/Virginia Beach? I don’t know where you are trying to make calls, but I haven’t had any trouble with service at all anywhere in southside Hampton Roads.
Why is no one taking into account the fact that Verizon is realeasing the Google Nexus One in the next few months. If that doesn’t show that they are starting to relinquish having total control over their phones, than I don’t know what does.
Verizon may be “slow” to adapt, but they will adapt none the less. They are smart enough to know what they have to do to continue making money and capture market share…
Remember…. in the end.. business is business…
@ATT Griping is Getting Old,
Yes, dropped calls can occur on any carrier. I have Sprint and I think I may have had 3 dropped calls all of last year. And yes, I do use my phone a lot.
Contrast this with my iPhone mates on AT&T;. When I talk to them, if the call is very long, they could drop 3 times in that one conversation. How do I know it is them and not me? I don’t. But when they call me back they say how tired they are of their goddamn phone dropping calls every other word so I just assume it must happen to them a lot.
Besides, when I call landlines, other Sprint users or Verizon phones I have no drops apart from the 3 or so a year I mentioned. I don’t know if those are me or the other party so I just assume they are me. And for T-Mobile? When I talk to friends on that network we don’t experience dropped calls either, but, lots of times the conversation is so “staticy” that I can’t understand a word they are saying requiring a hang up and call back. I’ve never had that issue calling anyone except T-Mobile users.
I live in Dallas, a larger market that should have great service from “all” of the carriers. Every one has my area in the darkest color on the map indicating top voice and data service.
Actually Apple came to Sprint first which many don’t know and Forsee turned them away because they wanted ulitmate control over content, marketing and how the user experience was managed. That went against Sprints commitement to the user experience as it appears Verizon squalked at too. ATT was stupid enough to allow that effort and while the revenue is unquestionable for them they clearly have lost the user experience and will suffer the consequences as soon as the iphone is made available on other networks. Let’s face it Apple knows the more carriers that carry their product generate more users and more money for everyone. It would be nice to finally put the “carriers” networks to the real test by having the iphone on the big three. It would come down to user experience at that point and I think the clear leader would be Sprint purely based on their network speeds and overall coverage. Plus with 4G available already and making strides across the company it won’t be long before the user can experience true landline connection speeds just about anywhere.