Verizon rumors again

[Seadog]

The latest is that a manufacturer has a contract to deliver CDMA (Verizon) iPhone 4s to Apple this fall. According to the rumor, it will be right after the September announcement that is scheduled by Apple, and in time for the holiday sales.

 

[y2kgtp]

Apple has a 5 year agreement with AT&T to be the sole provider of the iPhone. It was announced Jan 07 (Launched June 07) so I think we have a couple more years to go......

However VZW is testing a version of the iPad currently, as they have no such agreement for this device. Perhaps people can buy one for 30$ with a new, 2 year agreement

 

[Seadog]

It is possible for a person to replace the AT&T chip with a CDMA chip that will work on Verizon. However, five year contract means little in the business. If it is true that they signed a five year contract, Apple just has to say that AT&T is not able to support the number of iPhones and iPads being sold, and renegotiate. They might have planned on going with Verizon for a second carrier before the intro of the iPhone 4, and AT&T negotiated a 4-6 month exclusive agreement for concessions.

 

[y2kgtp]

It is possible for a person to replace the AT&T chip with a CDMA chip that will work on Verizon. However, five year contract means little in the business. If it is true that they signed a five year contract, Apple just has to say that AT&T is not able to support the number of iPhones and iPads being sold, and renegotiate. They might have planned on going with Verizon for a second carrier before the intro of the iPhone 4, and AT&T negotiated a 4-6 month exclusive agreement for concessions.

The average person is not going to be able to convert a SIM card phone\device over to CDMA.

I agree on the negotiations piece due to the number of problems AT&T has had recently. Apple could likely get out of the contract. Maybe in another year or so.

 

[Seadog]

Apple has gone on record that they will eventually have to move past just AT&T. AT&T knows that it would be in their best interests to allow Apple to sell to other carriers and gain rights for first dibs on future iPhones, iPads, etc. It use to be that only AT&T sold the iPhones, but if you noticed, this model will be sold by Radio Shack and Best Buy. With the numbers for the iPhone 4 intro, a month of sales before they get sold by Verizon and T-Mobile would go a long way.