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Both Telecom Italia and Vodafone to Offer iPhone in Italy

bruk201ib

bruk201ib

macrumors member
Original poster
Sep 6, 2007
60
0
London, UK
News reported on Macitynet (http://macitynet.it/macity/aA32221/ufficiale_iphone_italia_c.shtml) shows that TIM and Vodafone will be the official carriers of the iPhone in Italy.

TIM (http://www.telecomitalia.itnull/ep/...+Italia&contentId=32030&contentType=EDITORIAL) and Vodafone (http://www.areaprivati.190.it/190/t...5&programId=10066&tk=9616,c&ty_key=pri_iphone) officially announced today that they will be offering the iPhone in Italy. Vodafone added in their press release that they will be offering the Apple's phone also in Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey. (http://www.vodafone.com/start/media_relations/news/group_press_releases/2007/vodafone_to_offer0.html)

No more details have been released about release date, tariffs or iPhone model; but the fact that Vodafone doesn't have an EDGE network in Italy, is almost certain it will be the 3G version.

Some details can be assumed from Vodafone's press release, where it states that with the purchase of the phone the user will be "linked" to their networks, therefore the iPhone will be locked.

This probably means that the iPhones sold by TIM and Vodafone will be locked to their networks.

According to the rumors over the net, Apple will sell an unlocked version of the phone. The difference between the phones will be in the price, discounted for TIM and Vodafone, full price if purchased from Apple.

The question now is the price for the device. It could be one model for €499 and another for €399, but it could be also anothe model for €599. Would these be the full prices or the operator discounted prices?... we just have to wait and see.
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2008/05/06/both-telecom-italia-and-vodafone-to-offer-iphone-in-italy/
MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Apr 12, 2001
63,489
30,726
Both Telecom Italia and Vodafone to Offer iPhone in Italy



Both Telecom Italia and Vodafone independently announced that they have signed agreements with Apple to provide the iPhone in Italy. This, of course, clearly indicates that Apple has abandoned the exclusive single-carrier model that they have established in other markets.

Absent from these announcements are any details, but earlier rumors had indicated that this represents the 3G iPhone and that there will be no permanent exclusive distribution by a single operator. Instead, it was said that Telecom Italia may have the right to sell the iPhone for some months in advance of their competitors.

Apple has been widely rumored to release their 3G capable iPhone in the coming months with many expecting an announcement at Apple's Wordwide Developer Conference in June.

Article Link
 
H

hashkey

macrumors newbie
Nov 8, 2004
13
0
MacRumors said:
This, of course, clearly indicates that Apple has abandoned the exclusive single-carrier model that they have established in other markets.
Click to expand...

It does indicate that Apple strategy will vary in territories where there is little or no post-pay market to speak of- Italy being one of those territories- but it shouldn't lead anyone to think that they'll necessarily do the same in other markets.
 
MattJessop

MattJessop

macrumors regular
Apr 24, 2007
215
43
Manchester, UK
Sounds like good news to me. Although there might be different market strategies for different markets as mentioned above, even this alone makes it better for the consumer. Like the iPhone in France was unlocked, but expensive because there was no real competition to here. Now at least there can be competition; which may even bring more users into the Apple brand.
 
L

Lito

macrumors newbie
Jul 27, 2003
24
0
Quo vadis?



So: implicit acceptance that the single carrier exclusivity deals, while useful in launching a new & game- changing product into the real world, are not for long term pursuance.

Actually a bust business wise & a source of customer frustration & impediment.

Will the existing deals be persisted with? Or does Apple have an exit strategy?
 
L

l0ne

macrumors newbie
May 5, 2005
6
0
Important detail

Important detail: Vodafone does not offer an EDGE network in Italy. (Telecom does.)
 
avigalante

avigalante

macrumors 6502
Feb 18, 2007
425
16
New York City
MattJessop said:
Sounds like good news to me. Although there might be different market strategies for different markets as mentioned above, even this alone makes it better for the consumer. Like the iPhone in France was unlocked, but expensive because there was no real competition to here. Now at least there can be competition; which may even bring more users into the Apple brand.
Click to expand...

I think that's the correct sentiment.

Given the lackluster performance thus far in the EU, it makes sense that Apple may want to reach as many people as possible by launching the iPhone on multiple carriers.

That said, I don't expect this business model to hit the US anytime soon.
 
I

IscariotJ

macrumors 6502a
Jan 13, 2004
637
66
UK
I'm hoping that the exclusive agreement only covered the initial iPhone release. There are enough carriers in the UK to provide some competition....

Being able to buy an unlocked iPhone would be ideal, especially considering some of the recent reports regarding O2/CPW....
 
J

joemama

macrumors 6502
Apr 21, 2003
366
3
That's great....but....

What does this mean for the US? Will we see multiple carriers?
 
P

phatspider

macrumors 6502
May 20, 2005
321
107
sananda said:
o2 in the uk didn't either.
Click to expand...

I know for a fact VF will not invest anything in EDGE networks

So either it will be GPRS (v unlikley) or 3G (very likely)

Fingers crossed it will be HSDPA too with speeds of up to 7.2mbps which is starting to become more widely supported on VF networks globally
 
S

seedster2

macrumors 6502a
Sep 16, 2007
686
0
NYC
Multiple carriers does not necessarily mean unlocked. It could mean that locked phones are going to their respective networks.

I don't think this will have much impact on the US region. After all, there's no need to change the plan here as the phone sold extremely well. The model only failed overseas.

I foresee the sales number dropping or flatenning out domestically with out subsidization. Economy is worrisome and price is has become a consideration and foreigners will have little need to source product stateside.
 
J

JoaoPinheiro

macrumors newbie
May 6, 2008
11
0
So I guess it's safe to assume that the new iPhones won't be locked to any particular carriers. Does anyone have any idea if they will be locked to particular countries, however? I live in Portugal and I'm moving over to Finland next year, so it'd be nice to be able to switch carriers in a year without having to unlock the phone.
 
J

JoaoPinheiro

macrumors newbie
May 6, 2008
11
0
Project said:
I don't think we can make this assumption just yet.
Click to expand...

Wishful thinking never hurt anyone xD Still, it's a lot easier for the Apple Stores to stock unlocked iPhones than to stock iPhones locked to each one of the carriers for each particular country. The carriers probably have a minimum contract length anyway, so the locking issue becomes moot for them.
 
Dimwhit

Dimwhit

macrumors 68020
Apr 10, 2007
2,068
297
seedster2 said:
I don't think this will have much impact on the US region. After all, there's no need to change the plan here as the phone sold extremely well. The model only failed overseas.
Click to expand...

Not only that, but didn't Apple and AT&T sign a 5-year exclusivity deal? Maybe it wasn't that long, but I thought it was. If so, there's no changing here anytime soon.
 
Willis

Willis

macrumors 68020
Apr 23, 2006
2,293
54
Beds, UK
Possible good news... I'm off to Italy in August. If 02 or another op. provide an iPhone plan as a sim only offer, I would hop on that! Certainly if I can get an iPhone cheaper too.
 
K

kornyboy

macrumors 68000
Sep 27, 2004
1,529
0
Knoxville, TN (USA)
Wirelessly posted (iPhone: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/4A102 Safari/419.3)

Hopefully this sort of thing will carry across many other countries. It will sell more phones since people will not have to switch to a carrier that they don't like.
 
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