“Sprint and T-Mobile USA customers may not have to wait that long for a shot at the next iPhone,” Roger Cheng reports for CNET.
“That’s according to Piper Jaffray analyst Chris Larsen, the latest to weigh in on the mounting speculation that carriers beyond AT&T and Verizon Wireless will get the next iPhone,” Cheng reports. “Last week, Citadel analyst Shing Yin said he believed Apple would begin selling the iPhone for Sprint later this year.”
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Cheng reports, “Adding Sprint and T-Mobile would increase Apple’s addressable market by 30 percent, Larsen said.”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Thumper” for the heads up.]
One model, two carriers in the US market has slowed the growth of Andriod. Next, add two more carriers and one additional model.
Android blows circuit in US. Google “searching” for answers- Bing!
Nail in the coffin when that happens.
Not everyone can afford or wants to pay $80.00-$100.00 a month on top of paying $200.00-$300.00 for an iPhone on contract. If Apple wants to increase the iPhone it needs to lower its cost (profit margin) on the iPhone. This will increase the iPhone’s footprint many fold. Not doing so will only give Andriod and other systems a chance to catch their breath and even catch up. Since the beginning of time, price sells.
Thanks to the carriers in the US, we currently have over 25 different models of Android phones on the market. How many of them are only carrier-differentiated variations of the same device, we’ll never know (unless someone bothers to waste inordinate amount of time to figure that out). In other words, carriers have forced handset makers to build “exclusive” models, forcing elimination of some features or others, forcing crapware/bloadware, forcing customised user interface, all running on practically same or similar hardware.
So far, Blackberry was probably the only maker that had models available on most US carriers.
And now, there’s a chance that Apple may join.
Android blows, so I’m guessing “bload” is the past tense of blow.
I don’t think it actually increases “Apple’s addressable market by 30 percent” because a lot of those Sprint and T-Mobile customers would have switched to AT&T or Verizon, if they really wanted an iPhone.
However, now that Verizon has iPhone, I can see no down-side (for Apple) if Sprint and T-Mobile gets iPhone too.
(I’m going to get a used iPhone 3gs on eBay, after the next iPhone is released and current iPhone 3gs owners start upgrading en masse. I’ll use it with AT&T’s GoPhone service.)
There’s no way Sprint & T-Mobile represent 30% of the addressable market in the world. Maybe America but not the total addressable market.
Americans are so insular.
Since the writer was talking about Apple going “beyond AT&T and Verizon,” he meant addressable market in the U.S.
The ENTIRE U.S. mobile phone market is probably not even 30% compare to just China. 🙂
“Americans are so insular.”
Lol. Really?
Wohhh! Steady with the generalisations, althego! You don’t want to end up sounding like Ballmer’s Left Nut – you’re better than that! Perhaps the article mentioned above was referring to the American market in the first place, though not explicitly stated.
And no, I’m not American.
a lot of those Sprint and T-Mobile customers would have switched to AT&T or Verizon
Or not. Things like employer choices, signal strength where you need it, or bad experience with Verizon or AT&T billing & customer service may make them holdouts.
It will be interesting to see what happens in the iPhone vs. Android competition when carrier choice is no longer an issue.
I remember the days when nearly everyone on MDN dismissed the idea of Apple expanding beyond AT&T in America. When the overwhelming consensus was that Apple would neverrrr make a CDMA iPhone. How quickly things can change.
That voice is the same one I hear whenever some moron tells me the iPhone doesn’t need a larger screen or more than one model. No, Apple would neverrrrr do such a thing.
The “voice” that said Apple would not offer a CDMA iPhone was right for THREE years. Just as the “voice” that says Apple will not offer a larger screen iPhone THIS YEAR is probably right.
That does not necessarily mean Apple will “neverrrrr” do it…
I don’t think “nearly everyone on MDN dismiss[ing] the idea of Apple expanding beyond AT&T in America” meant forever. If I remember correctly, it had to do with rational people pointing out that Apple’s 5 year exclusivity contract with AT&T had not expired. There’s a BIG difference.
I was wrong. Bit I and many other people also noted that as time passed (years) and 4G kept slipping out, Apple might have to implement CDMA as a stop-gap. I had hoped that a multi-function chipset might be available to enable GSM/CDMA that would also offer an upgrade path to LTE and 4G.
Boom!
@ken1w
I think u are Soooooo wrong about People on T-Mobile who wanted an iPhone would already Switched to either Verizon or AT&T.
I have been with T-Mobile since 1997 and Just happen 2b one of the Most Ardent Apple Customers.
(Trust me i own everything Apple)
who still uses an iPhone 2G Mainly because i will not switch to Either of the above, and i can bet u that their are Thousands of others like me who cannot wait 4 the iPhone to come to Magenta.
T-Mobile offers me great service so why should i switch.
And i can bet u that many of those who left 4 another Network just 4 the iPhone would return if T-Mobile gets the iPhone this Year.
Just u wait and see.
R U Prince?
I left AT&T because of lousy reception issues. I’m on a family plan with T-Mobile and never have a problem. I want a iPhone but not enough to switch to another telco.
You should read what I said. I said “a lot,” NOT “all” (or “everyone”). My wording was very intentional. And I’m very sure “a lot” of former Sprint and T-Mobile customers who wanted an iPhone DID already switch to AT&T or Verizon to get one.
If there are only “thousands of others” left on T-Mobile waiting for iPhone 4, than I would say that “a lot” of them got tired of waiting and switched to AT&T or Verizon already.
I was just making commentary that adding T-Mobile and Sprint to the iPhone mix is not going to suddenly increase iPhone sales by 30%. There was nothing in my comment regarding level of service or customer satisfaction.
I have stayed with T-Mobile, too. Some people switched to AT&T or Verizon to get the iPhone. But I suspect that many current T-Mobile customers might consider an iPhone when (if) it becomes available on their current provider.
The conditionals that you used in your post are recognized. It was probably the tone of your post that rubbed some people the wrong way (neverrr, moron, etc.). It was very I-told-you-so.
Moron? Don’t put words in my mouth… 🙂 And the “neverrrr” was in a different post, and I was quoting from someone else’s annoying “I-told-you-so” post. I think you read R2, not me.
it would be about time Apple included the “other” carriers.
T-Mobile is likely — especially with the AT&T and T-Mobile deal possibly happening.
Sprint is much less likely.
Why? WiMAX versus LTE. Sprint is the *only* major carrier in the U.S. that is going with WiMAX for its 4G service. It is one of the few significant carriers in the world going with WiMAX for its 4G service. In fac, I cannot think of even one other *major* carrier in the world that is going with WiMAX.
Why would Apple move to include Sprint knowing full well that they will have to build a special Sprint variant of the hardware? Sure, a lot of handset makers do that, but Apple is all about not having specialty models (dates back to Steve killing off the literally dozens of different Mac models back in the 90s — having such unique models goes directly against Apple underlying philosophies).
Yeah reception comes into play and value. ATT and Verizon aren’t good EVERYWHERE and same goes for Sprint. I mean look at it this way my wife was on Spring when we got married and I was t-mobile she had dropped calls and rare 3G in our house while I had great reception and fast speeds.
It only makes sense to be on all of the networks. Android made a huge dent in the market because of cost and availability on whatever network you were on. Apple would get more market share going to Sprint and t-mobile but I agree that the cost might still keep some away. $50 for an Android phone or $200 for an iPhone? An average user might take cost.
I would just like to have the option. I love Android but because of fragmentation and sometimes no followup to some phones (so have to get a totally different one) would consider iPhone. Guess we’ll see in September.