Apple has best product launch ever

Apple today said its iPhone 4 introduction broke all previous sales records by selling 1.7 million phones from Thursday through Saturday. The launch is Apple's most successful ever and comes even as Apple had scaled back its rollout to five countries. Company chief Steve Jobs acknowledged that there were already shortages in the first wave.

"We apologize to those customers who were turned away because we did not have enough supply," Jobs said in a brief statement.

The introduction is exactly 70 percent larger than that for the iPhone 3GS, which managed one million units in its own launch weekend but was also reaching countries that this year won't get the phone until July, such as Canada, Australia, New Zealand and more European countries.

It should also represent the largest launch ever for any cellphone. Nokia has often enjoyed larger economies of scale for its phones but has rarely had highly anticipated, coordinated launches. Android has had accelerating overall sales but never a launch on the order of an iPhone release. Even the Motorola Droid, its most successful device to date, had only reached 525,000 units two months after its November unveiling.

By Electronista Staff