Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

APPLEFAN8

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jun 30, 2007
1,183
3
NJ/GA/FL
I was just thinking. Why not have the Iphone for Verizon, Sprint, T-mobile. Like on all networks, they could make more money. If it was like I would get the iphone and probably not get the LG Dare which I like alot!(Please don't flame) lol
 
They probably wouldn't make more money at all.

Don't forget that apple probably take a cut out of your monthly AT&T/O2 bill, as well as making money on the phone itself. And remember what it was like with all the network operators racing to get iPhone exclusivity? Why would they do that if exclusivity of the handset wasnt very much worth their while?
 
Please learn how to use the search function.

Apple+AT&T+Exclustivity Agreement= NO iPHONE FOR VERIZON/SPRINT/T-MOBILE/STUPID LITTLE INSIGNIFICANT PROVIDERS (METRO PCS/ALTELL/ETC.)

Enjoy your day and the wonders of the search box.

Don
 
Please learn how to use the search function.

Apple+AT&T+Exclustivity Agreement= NO iPHONE FOR VERIZON/SPRINT/T-MOBILE/STUPID LITTLE INSIGNIFICANT PROVIDERS (METRO PCS/ALTELL/ETC.)

Enjoy your day and the wonders of the search box.

Don

Oh i'm sorry! No one said you had to answered. I like to ask my own questions. Thanks though.
 
Oh i'm sorry! No one said you had to answer. I like to ask my own questions, even if it clogs up the forums with questions that have been answered a million times before. Thanks though.

Fixed, and your very welcome. Have a Merry Christmas/whatever you celebrate.

Don
 
Because at this point CDMA is worthless to port to and LTE will be out in two years.

It's not worth the money they put in at this point to make a CDMA iPhone. Therefore, no Verizon, no Sprint.

I know he did say, verizon and sprint specifically, but he directed at all carriers as well. So if they did release it for all GSM wouldn't the revenues be crazy? Or is it, there has to be competition?
 
It's not worth the money they put in at this point to make a CDMA iPhone. Therefore, no Verizon, no Sprint.

Supporting CDMA is still worth the money.

Marketing to everyone is why a company like HTC is making huge profits selling both GSM and CDMA versions of their smartphones, while gaining large market footholds.

Look at the HTC Diamond series. It's being sold by every major player in the USA and around the world. And it's available with VGA output, video recording, Slingplayer, TomTom GPS, MMS, and lots of other stuff that hardcore phone users want.

As much as they've sold, Apple has basically given away half the USA market and large sections of overseas markets by handicapping themselves with their "exclusive" deals with carriers, and with their strange app store hangups.

Future cell phone histories will be interesting to read, as they look back on what Apple did right and what they did wrong. Ignoring 2/3 of the USA is one action.
 
Look at the HTC Diamond series. It's being sold by every major player in the USA and around the world. And it's available with VGA output, video recording, Slingplayer, TomTom GPS, MMS, and lots of other stuff that hardcore phone users want.


So why don't you buy one?
 
Look at the HTC Diamond series. It's being sold by every major player in the USA and around the world. And it's available with VGA output, video recording, Slingplayer, TomTom GPS, MMS, and lots of other stuff that hardcore phone users want.

1. Windows Mobile..
2. Ugly phones
 
Because at this point CDMA is worthless to port to and LTE will be out in two years.

It's not worth the money they put in at this point to make a CDMA iPhone. Therefore, no Verizon, no Sprint.

Not true. Apple's first choice was Verizon, rather than AT&T. In fact, with the Alltel buy-out, Verizon will have the largest network in the US. Wonder if Apple knew about this when they were courting Verizon?

The real reason: The money AT&T is paying/paid Apple >>>> money that Apple would have made if they didn't sign an exclusive deal with AT&T.
 
Please learn how to use the search function.

Apple+AT&T+Exclustivity Agreement= NO iPHONE FOR VERIZON/SPRINT/T-MOBILE/STUPID LITTLE INSIGNIFICANT PROVIDERS (METRO PCS/ALTELL/ETC.)

Enjoy your day and the wonders of the search box.

Don

So the question is: "Wouldn't Apple make more money if they sold the phone unlocked? Why don't they?"

I must be a real dunce because I'm not finding all the threads you're talking about. All I'm coming up with are threads about how it's not on Verizon and how Apple got sued in France. Those aren't exactly right, so maybe you could help me.
 
So why don't you buy one?

<shrug> Don't have to. I'm sure one of the carriers I do contract work for, will give me one sooner or later, as they usually do.

The point is, it's very naive to say that there's no market in CDMA, especially since 120+ million USA subscribers, and almost quarter of the world's 3G users, are on it. And the number of those who went to ATT to get an iPhone, just isn't that large.

Waiting for LTE isn't necessarily a panacea, either, since each network will have its own frequencies. Moreover, some carriers might opt to use LTE only for data and keep their old UMTS/CDMA voice radios.
 
So the question is: "Wouldn't Apple make more money if they sold the phone unlocked? Why don't they?"

They got paid a shed load of money by AT&T/O2 for the exclusivity deal, and on top of that a portion of your monthly line rental also goes to Apple. Basically they've milked the iPhone for every penny they possibly could, which is why it's so expensive compared to any other phone (at least here in the UK). Other manufacturers just sell their handsets to providers.
 
They got paid a shed load of money by AT&T/O2 for the exclusivity deal, and on top of that a portion of your monthly line rental also goes to Apple. Basically they've milked the iPhone for every penny they possibly could, which is why it's so expensive compared to any other phone (at least here in the UK). Other manufacturers just sell their handsets to providers.

This has to be true or otherwise Apple wouldn't have done it. The bean counters at Apple crunched the numbers and realized that they would make more money with exclusive deals than selling an unlocked phone. True, AT&T probably sent a boat load of money Apple's way. As for markets where it didn't make financial sense (carriers weren't paying enough for the exclusive deal), the phones are sold unlocked (like Italy).
 
Supporting CDMA is still worth the money.

Not when they're switching to LTE in two years.

In fact, with the Alltel buy-out, Verizon will have the largest network in the US. Wonder if Apple knew about this when they were courting Verizon?

The real reason: The money AT&T is paying/paid Apple >>>> money that Apple would have made if they didn't sign an exclusive deal with AT&T.

Okay... and I said "at this time". Meaning with the LTE switch in two years. CDMA is a dead-end now. If they would have gotten the time out of it that they have, did, and will get out of GSM before the switch, it would have been a viable solution.
 
This has to be true or otherwise Apple wouldn't have done it. The bean counters at Apple crunched the numbers and realized that they would make more money with exclusive deals than selling an unlocked phone. True, AT&T probably sent a boat load of money Apple's way. As for markets where it didn't make financial sense (carriers weren't paying enough for the exclusive deal), the phones are sold unlocked (like Italy).

Well said. Those who are saying "developing for CDMA isn't worth the money" are pretending to be experts when they don't know what the hell they are talking about. I'm so sick of posts like that. Go tell that to RIM.

Apple leveraged exclusivity to earn themselves an extremely lucrative deal with AT&T. Bottom line. I would bet my next paycheck that Apple has already developed a CDMA prototype that works just fine, and they showed this to AT&T when the last deal expired and it was time to strike a new one. Steve keeps his options open.

This is why we now have a subsidized iPhone and why AT&T announced in their shareholder conference call last June that they would take a big hit on iPhone subsidies over the next couple of years but that they saw it as a long term investment in subscriber growth. This is also why Steve Jobs is laughing all the way to the bank.
 
Why doesn't people research before repeating the same question that's been answered a million times?

Sprint, Verizon does not use international GSM standard, and thus their network hardware is incompatible with 99% of phones in the world.
 
Well, every carrier is doing it, so it's apparently good.

do LTE carriers use SIM Cards? in other words i'm asking if Verizon is going to be a SIM Card carrier in the future because i hate the whole "activation" setup they currently use, though i might be the only one because of my bad experiences.
 
Sprint, Verizon does not use international GSM standard, and thus their network hardware is incompatible with 99% of phones in the world.

Yes, we all know it would have to be a non-GSM phone if it were on Verizon. Many phone manufacturers make both types. That's not a big deal.

As for the millions of dumbphone users in third world GSM countries... they're meaningless in a discussion of Apple creating a CDMA smartphone for Verizon. Moreover, Verizon will soon have more users than ATT, and since ATT has half of world sales, adding Verizon could easily make them a third of the total. That's huge.

As far as waiting for new protocols, we've already seen that Apple is quite willing to put out older radio models just to save themselves some money. They did that with the first EDGE-only iPhone in the USA, and they did even worse by selling the same crippled model in the mostly 3G-only UK.
 
Why because Steve Jobs wanted to **** us in the ass with horrid AT&T service, coverage and crappy slow ass network, duh!
 
LTE is not GSM, and it doesn't replace GSM or CDMA

First off, Long Term Evolution (LTE) is one of several choices for 4G data. It is not technically related to either GSM or CDMA. It's something new.

Because they had no other decent upgrade choices, the GSM group decided to go with LTE before the CDMA groups did. That started the myth that it was a GSM standard.

LTE is a 4G system for data, only. Voice has to be overlaid as VoIP... assuming the carrier wants to do that. And it all has to work with legacy circuit switched systems, which is something the original LTE standards left to the carriers to work out. Oddly, this means that Verizon will be driving a lot of the rules for other carriers.

It's also very possible that some carriers will deploy LTE for data ONLY, and keep their old GSM / CDMA radios for voice.

So, while it would be ideal, it's quite possible that an LTE phone won't work on all networks... at least not for a few years to come, if ever.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.