T-Mobile USA confirms plans for Apple sales in 2013
updated 01:01 pm EST, Thu December 6, 2012
Announcement all but guarantees iPhone on T-Mobile
T-Mobile USA will start selling Apple products in 2013, according to Rene Obermann, the CEO of T-Mobile parent company Deutsche Telekom. As was earlier speculated, Obermann revealed the plans during investors' day meetings held earlier today. Which products T-Mobile will carry hasn't been identified, but this presumably means some version of the iPhone, and likely the iPad as well.
T-Mobile has been gradually losing subscribers in the US market, something analysts have attributed to being the only national carrier without the iPhone. The company has in fact taken some unusual steps to reverse the bleed, namely encouraging people with unlocked iPhones to join its network. A strong hint that it was moving towards iPhone sales was the announcement of an iPhone-compatible network expansion.
If T-Mobile follows in the steps of Verizon, it could begin iPhone sales with a version of an existing model, in this case the iPhone 5. If not, it may have to wait many months for a next-generation device.
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Joined: 07-25-06
It will be interesting to see how this develops. I own two iPhones, because I can't afford one.
I'd like to be able to pass that 3G along to someone else, and not have to carry two gadgets around. But I can't, because AT&T refused to unlock my long paid-for 3GS. I wasn't the original owner, having bought it from a neighbor
Apple, T-Mobile, and the rest of the industry could do the world a host of good, if they'd unlock every paid-off iPhone, so they could be passed along to kids, nephews or needy students. In the end, more iPhones in use mean more income for everyone involved.
--Michael W. Perry, author of Hospital Gowns and Other Embarrassments