Apple Announces that Orange is Exclusive iPhone Carrier in France

[MacRumors]

Besides Leopard, Apple announced today that Orange will be the exclusive French carrier for the Apple iPhone. The iPhone will make its debut in France on Thursday November 29th.

"We are excited to partner with Orange and bring iPhone to France in time for the holidays," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "iPhone is an amazing product and we hope mobile users in France will love it as much as we do."

The 8GB iPhone will be sold in France through Orange's online and direct retail stores for 399 euros including V.A.T.

It's unclear what became of the negotiations surrounding the French law that requires mobile phones to be sold unlocked 6 months after launch.

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[Antares]

This is going to be great news for my relatives in France. They'll be happy to get the phone.

[P-Worm]

It will be interesting to see what is going to happen about the 6 month unlocking requirement.

P-Worm

[fastbite]

Originally Posted by P-Worm

It will be interesting to see what is going to happen about the 6 month unlocking requirement.

P-Worm

They will have to unlock. There is no way around it.

[IEatApples]

Originally Posted by fastbite

They will have to unlock. There is no way around it.

Agreed! The law is nonnegotiable!

[quigleybc]

le sigh

le jealous

[Drumjim85]

Originally Posted by fastbite

They will have to unlock. There is no way around it.

Maybe it will be unlocked, but will only have french text in the OS ... ?? that would discourage me from getting it...

[BigJohno]

I wonder if you get a an orange sim card that it will work for the american iphone. or an O2 sim card????

[Kwill]

Originally Posted by Drumjim85

Maybe it will be unlocked, but will only have french text in the OS ... ?? that would discourage me from getting it...

That is very likely. However, there are people living in France that do not speak French. Just as there are people living in the U.S. that do not speak English. So they would likely file a law suit if their phone changed languages after 6 months.

[AppleisTasty]

Maybe apple is planning to unlock all iPhones in 6 months.

[sjo]

Originally Posted by AppleisTasty

Maybe apple is planning to unlock all iPhones in 6 months.

well after 6 months of starting the sales in france the iphone has been in the markets for almost a whole year. besides that one year old phones are pretty retro in general, apple should be quite close to releasing the second iteration of iphone by then. so the unlocking of the first generation iphones might not be that much of an issue then...

[EagerDragon]

Originally Posted by P-Worm

It will be interesting to see what is going to happen about the 6 month unlocking requirement.

P-Worm

Maybe that is why Apple was asking for 30 percent share on the data and minutes .... since unlocking in 6 months would be robbing them from profits on the remainder 18 months.

[twoodcc]

Originally Posted by P-Worm

It will be interesting to see what is going to happen about the 6 month unlocking requirement.

P-Worm

yes that will be interesting.

still good news for those living in France

[GQB]

Originally Posted by P-Worm

It will be interesting to see what is going to happen about the 6 month unlocking requirement.

P-Worm

My $$ is on the unlocked version being in the neighborhood of $1000.

[Dr.Gargoyle]

Originally Posted by GQB

My $$ is on the unlocked version being in the neighborhood of $1000.

I am a huge Apple geek.
That said, there is not a chance in the world I would pay $999 (or 999€ as it would cost over here) for the iPhone in its current subpar form (No WCDMA 2100 or simple WCDMA, No GPS, No MMS, No third-party-apps)
The design and UI are brilliant, but that is it...

[Steflinsky]

M....e à O.....E. BIENSURE

[mihiruthere93]

man, this stuff is getting expensive!

good thing i live in the ol' US of A!

[mfronmark]

I hope they don't forget about Sweden

[DrV]

Originally Posted by mfronmark

I hope they don't forget about Sweden

They have not forgotten about the Nordic countries. However, it seems that we belong to the "second wave". Which is a nice way of saying that Apple has no idea how to circumvent the legislation dealing with mobile phone unlocking.

What is actually the situation in Sweden? I know Telia-Sonera has been having some negotiations with Apple, but at least in Finland the legislation is very clear at this point. The iPhone must not be locked to any carrier under any circumstances.

---

Just to give our friends on the other side of the Atlantic ocean some idea of the local unsubsidized cellular costs, I checked the prices of one of the nationwide operators:


National calls are around 8 cents/minute and 8 cents/SMS (around 0.11 USD), no cost for receiving calls or SMSs. Unlimited data access is around 12 EUR/month at 384 kbit/s and 22 EUR/mo. for 1024 kbit/s. All sorts of "1000 min/mo." packages may lower the prices more than by half but comparing them is very difficult. Switching to another carrier does not usually produce any costs to the customer.

A plain and simple phone costs around 50 EUR, a basic smart phone with 3G, camera, Symbian S60, etc. is around 250 EUR, and a real smart phone (Nokia N95) is around 600 euros. All prices include VAT (22% in here) and 1 EUR = 1.4 USD (unless the USD has continued its free fall).

---

So, the unsubsidized 1000 EUR for iPhone seems to be a bit high. The competition is around 600-700 EUR street price, so 700 EUR would be in the ballpark. The "400 EUR" price tag is not possible unsubsidized unless Apple knows better than, e.g., Nokia how to make phones at a low cost.