Um, like I said, CDMA makes up about 10-15% of the global mobile market. Most phone makers have determined that the BENEFIT of CDMA customers outweighs the COST of creating an additional model. U.S., Canada. South Korea, and Latin American countries make up the bulk of CDMA users. CDMA users have money too, unlike a large percentage of the GSM market, which is in developing countries, that can only afford to buy the cheapest of phones (low-profit margins).
Ignoring hundreds of millions of customers usually isn't a good thing.
But, like I already said, Apple will probably end up OK because of their approach.
However, on the topic of ignoring hundreds of millions of customers, Apple will need to be careful in China if they take their current approach there. With both of the large firms having hundreds of millions of subscribers, they do they will miss out on a massive amount of potential customers.
10 to 15% would indicate that the remaining 90 or 85% percent are GSM. Why bother making a CDMA version when the few countries using CDMA also have GSM networks available?
I think the very fact that Apple, a very American centric company, chose to release the phone in the United States as a GSM phone goes a long way into saying what the real value of CDMA is.
The notion what CDMA users have money, and GSM is the standard in 3rd world countries is pretty laughable.