Verizon to Preview New Android Devices, Not iPhone at CES?

[cvaldes]

Exactly the point. AT&T's HSPA coverage isn't anything to crow about. So even though they'll have HSPA+, a good number of people will still be falling back to EDGE (which is slower than EVDO and no simultaneous Voice/Data).

No, you missed the point. AT&T can't upgrade all HSPA units to HSPA+ instantaneously. They concentrate on major metropolitan areas in getting the higher-speed technologies, whereas the outlying areas will get attention later. The HSPA gear is eventually deployed in EDGE areas to expand 3G coverage.

No U.S. carrier can crow about their 3G data performance (or any other aspect of their network). In this year's Consumer Reports survey, Verizon was a 36" giant in a land of 35" midgets. Same with last year's survey. AT&T dropped, Sprint made a little progress, but on a whole, no American mobile operator can be proud of their customer satisfaction ratings.

 

[dethmaShine]

And what makes CDMA old tech? Do you know anything about it?

As far as I understand as a communication systems engineer, I don't buy the technology. To me, TDMA is much more advantageous in almost every case.

Also, I wouldn't say CDMA is old tech as it came after TDMA but has a lot of limitations and disadvantages. Search Google/Bing and you would know.

 

[SerenityInt]

Correct.

Apple announces new Apple products, not their partners.

Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg is not gonna be announcing any new Apple iDevices at CES or anywhere else. Ever.

Steve, Tim, Jonny, Phil. Those guys will announce new Apple products.

I'll reiterate what I said a few months ago:

I envision it going this way...

Ivan talks for 30-40 min about how it is building out it's 4G/LTE network, adding more coverage, yada yada yada..

Then he says, "Oh, and one more thing.." and Steve Jobs walks out. The rest is history.

 

[NKT]

No, you missed the point. AT&T can't upgrade all HSPA units to HSPA+ instantaneously. They concentrate on major metropolitan areas in getting the higher-speed technologies, whereas the outlying areas will get attention later. The HSPA gear is eventually deployed in EDGE areas to expand 3G coverage.

No U.S. carrier can crow about their 3G data performance (or any other aspect of their network). In this year's Consumer Reports survey, Verizon was a 36" giant in a land of 35" midgets. Same with last year's survey. AT&T dropped, Sprint made a little progress, but on a whole, no American mobile operator can be proud of their customer satisfaction ratings.

He made the point about falling back to EVDO from LTE as being crappy. I simply pointed out that falling from HSPA/HSPA+ to EDGE is even crappier and more likely to happen given VZW's push to roll LTE nationwide and AT&T's lack of 3G outside the metro areas.

VZW will probably have the majority of their footprint LTE before AT&T even finishes their HSPA to HSPA+ upgrades, saying nothing of upgrading their EDGE network...

 

[Poll Smoker]

And way to try to assign logic to rumors and speculation to try and debunk me. Classier.

Reported btw....

 

[Geckotek]

First, only Apple will announce new Apple products. Anyone who preempts Steve gets their ass handed to them.

Unless it's just a CDMA iPhone 4, which isn't exactly new. Other carriers announce release of the iPhone 4 all the time.

Not saying Jobs won't announce it, perhaps a CDMA version is big enough news that he will. Just saying anything is possible.

Second, why are people still talking about iPhone on any carrier other than ATT until 2012? Do people not remember that 5-year exclusivity contract? Unless ATT has agreed to let Apple out of the contract, there will be no VZ iPhone in 2011.

You mean unless one of them has exercised some exit clause, don't you? It's totally possible that AT&T didn't meet some SLA or one of them decided they didn't want to share revenue any longer. There are a myriad of reasons why the contract could have ended. For one, it was rewritten at least once in 2008 according to an AT&T conf call.

 

[cvaldes]

So we're pretty much saying that Apple will make the announcement if it's true at all, and that if they don't announce it alongside the ipad 2, then it won't happen at all in the near future.

Correct.

At this point, it is unlikely that Apple would preannounce much in the way of new hardware. Both the original iPhone and the iPad were entirely new products, so they were willing to give a sneak preview.

Either they announce in January or March, not February. The lunar new year is in early February and all the factories in China are shut down for a couple of weeks. No production ramp when the manufacturing lines are cold.

Frankly, I would not expect Apple to announce a new iPad until the spring. They would probably need two solid months of ramp to accumulate enough inventory for launch in certain markets (the rest of the world would still be staggered and the product would be highly allocated).

God only knows if they will ever announce a CDMA handset. I am still very unconvinced about this since it appears that Apple has made no push to hire CDMA engineers. There are probably a couple on staff doing prototyping work, but if there was a CDMA iPhone going to production, there would be more than just a couple of CDMA engineers. They aren't going to rely on Verizon, Sprint, or Qualcomm to tell them how to design a CDMA handset. Apple would do it themselves.

 

[Geckotek]

As far as I understand as a communication systems engineer, I don't buy the technology. To me, TDMA is much more advantageous in almost every case.

Also, I wouldn't say CDMA is old tech as it came after TDMA but has a lot of limitations and disadvantages. Search Google/Bing and you would know.

I do know, don't need to Google. I worked in the industry when they were both released. And being a comm systems eng you should know that TDMA had crappy voice quality. It's common knowledge. I remember when it first rolled out and people thought we were talking under water. LOL

Besides, TDMA is being replaced in the 3G areas with WCDMA. Just as CDMA has been upgraded to CDMA2000 and then EV-DO.

But to call one "old technology" just shows people know nothing about either technology.

 

[DTphonehome]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A306 Safari/6531.22.7)

All I can say is, Apple better get with the program already and get on more US carriers. Android is such a threat only because the iPhone isn't available, so people go for the next best thing. Android hardly sells on AT&T. Apple is losing valuable time and allowing google to build marketshare. I don't care what the terms of the AT&T contract are… they better get out of it, and pronto.

 

[cvaldes]

Other carriers announce release of the iPhone 4 all the time.

After Apple has issued their statement.

 

[rkw0211]

Correct.

At this point, it is unlikely that Apple would preannounce much in the way of new hardware. Both the original iPhone and the iPad were entirely new products, so they were willing to give a sneak preview.

Either they announce in January or March, not February. The lunar new year is in early February and all the factories in China are shut down for a couple of weeks. No production ramp when the manufacturing lines are cold.

Frankly, I would not expect Apple to announce a new iPad until the spring. They would probably need two solid months of ramp to accumulate enough inventory for launch in certain markets (the rest of the world would still be staggered and the product would be highly allocated).

God only knows if they will ever announce a CDMA handset. I am still very unconvinced about this since it appears that Apple has made no push to hire CDMA engineers. There are probably a couple on staff doing prototyping work, but if there was a CDMA iPhone going to production, there would be more than just a couple of CDMA engineers. They aren't going to rely on Verizon, Sprint, or Qualcomm to tell them how to design a CDMA handset. Apple would do it themselves.

You don't think that their existing engineers have the ability to design a CDMA handset? For all we know, they could've been designing this thing for years.

 

[KnightWRX]

After Apple has issued their statement.

Point me to the Apple statement about the Telus and Bell launch of the iPhone please. Hint : There wasn't one.

 

[Diode]

Apple is not going to release a new iPhone five months before releasing the iPhone 5.

They released a revised 2G in Feb (adding 16GB) and then released the 3G 5 months later....

 

[7o7munoz7o7]

AT&T is fantastic in my area.

until you call them for any kind of support. that word fantastic you used, will be NO where in your vocabulary after that.

 

[OllyW]

After Apple has issued their statement.

T-Mobile and Three announced they were getting the iPhone in the UK without any statements from Apple.

 

[NoExpectations]

Past failed predictions:

Verizon will get the iPhone in 2007.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2008.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2009.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2010.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2011.

I predict that someone will predict that Verizon will get the iPhone in 2012.

 

[rkw0211]

Point me to the Apple statement about the Telus and Bell launch of the iPhone please. Hint : There wasn't one.

I just wanted to let you know that someone understands your point. For all of you who seem to want to disagree for the sake of disagreeing, Steve Jobs didn't have a keynote for every product ever released. However, in my opinion, there WOULD be one for a Verizon/CDMA iPhone as it would have huge implications on the stock prices of all involved. Apple wouldn't let something like this go quietly.

 

[twoodcc]

well i think Mr. Jobs will announce the verizon iPhone. hopefully in january, along with the new iPad

 

[ten-oak-druid]

The announcement for a non-ATT iphone will come late in 2011. The non-ATT iphone will be available in 2012.

Hopefully all carriers will have next generation networks fully implemented at that point. And hopefully more than just Verizon get the iphone when it happens.

 

[Geckotek]

So we're pretty much saying that Apple will make the announcement if it's true at all, and that if they don't announce it alongside the ipad 2, then it won't happen at all in the near future.

I can see that being the case.

Correct.

At this point, it is unlikely that Apple would preannounce much in the way of new hardware. Both the original iPhone and the iPad were entirely new products, so they were willing to give a sneak preview.

Either they announce in January or March, not February. The lunar new year is in early February and all the factories in China are shut down for a couple of weeks. No production ramp when the manufacturing lines are cold.

Good point.

Frankly, I would not expect Apple to announce a new iPad until the spring. They would probably need two solid months of ramp to accumulate enough inventory for launch in certain markets (the rest of the world would still be staggered and the product would be highly allocated).

And it's not like it's a new product this time. They won't announce months before a retail launch.

God only knows if they will ever announce a CDMA handset. I am still very unconvinced about this since it appears that Apple has made no push to hire CDMA engineers. There are probably a couple on staff doing prototyping work, but if there was a CDMA iPhone going to production, there would be more than just a couple of CDMA engineers. They aren't going to rely on Verizon, Sprint, or Qualcomm to tell them how to design a CDMA handset. Apple would do it themselves.

Then I think you missed the postings a few months back when the was a push to hire CDMA engineers. There were actually CDMA job listings earlier this month.

 

[MacDawg]

until you call them for any kind of support. that word fantastic you used, will be NO where in your vocabulary after that.

I have had no issues with AT&T support, and to the contrary, most I have heard have said Verizon's support is terrible (Sprint's too). There are too many variables in this (location, who you talk to, how you talk to them, the issue) to make a blanket statement. If you listen to MR posters, you would think Apple's support was the world's worst, but it consistently gets high marks.

 

[cvaldes]

You don't think that their existing engineers have the ability to design a CDMA handset? For all we know, they could've been designing this thing for years.

Like I said, there are probably some CDMA engineers on Apple's payroll and have been building CDMA prototypes (maybe from the very beginning).

That said, I do not believe that they have enough engineering talent to launch another handset based on sufficiently different network technologies. Apple's headcount is very, very small for a company of its size. There have been multiple instances in the past where it appears that Apple has struggled to stay on schedule because of limited HR.

One piece of evidence: they created a new group: a new device bringup group charged with launching new technology. The common belief is that Apple was grabbing engineers from their regular duties and having them work on new products (e.g., iPhone, iPad, iOS) which delayed improvements in existing products (e.g., Macs, OS X).

I think that Apple would spend a few dollars to bring on a few more CDMA engineers to bring up a production-caliber handset that would generate hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue. Just my opinion.

 

[Geckotek]

Past failed predictions:

Verizon will get the iPhone in 2007.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2008.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2009.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2010.
Verizon will get the iPhone in 2011.

I predict that someone will predict that Verizon will get the iPhone in 2012.

Wow, what year is it where you live?!?!?

However, in my opinion, there WOULD be one for a Verizon/CDMA iPhone as it would have huge implications on the stock prices of all involved. Apple wouldn't let something like this go quietly.

Good point.

 

[cvaldes]

I have had no issues with AT&T support, and to the contrary, most I have heard have said Verizon's support is terrible (Sprint's too). There are too many variables in this (location, who you talk to, how you talk to them, the issue) to make a blanket statement. If you listen to MR posters, you would think Apple's support was the world's worst, but it consistently gets high marks.

Anecdotal commentary is nice, but not statistically significant except for the person offering the anecdote.

That's why you have to look at broader customer satisfaction surveys. No U.S. mobile operator can be proud of their customer satisfaction rating. They all suck; they are all midgets. Just look at Consumer Reports annual cellular service surveys. All U.S. carriers suck year after year.

As for Apple, regardless of the MR haters, they basically come up on top of every single customer satisfaction survey, whether it be product, customer support, whatever. Some people like to moan about how expensive Apple's gear is, but if saving money was so great, why aren't those people happier?

 

[NoExpectations]

Wow, what year is it where you live?!?!?

Well, I am going out on a limb here and predicting that Verizon won't get the iPhone in 2011. I don't think that they will get it until their 4G LTE footprint is large enough (2013?). There are too many disadvantages to CDMA (slow speed, lack of concurrent voice/data). Apple would be going backwards if they supported CDMA.