AT&T defends its iPhone network via YouTube outreach - Page 6

Apple built the iPhone with EDGE because that's what AT&T had. Apple was talking to Verizon, but Verizon balked. Had they signed up for it, we would've had a CDMA iPhone and presumably, a GSM iPhone for the international market...so Apple is willing to build to the network, given the right circumstances.

Verizon obviously anticipates LTE will be in devices in the next eighteen months, and well implemented to boot. Complete roll-out is alleged for early 2013...less than four years away. It's a giant gamble on their part, or they would be deploying some other bridged technology (like evolved HSDPA+) in the interim. Given the only real growth in the tech sector these days is in mobile widgets and their networks, I anticipate this tech will move faster than we currently realize.

Apple's timing on their product launches is currently one a year for the iPhone. However I imagine a considerable modification of that schedule in their internal road map based on a variable no one outside of the company knows for sure: when the contract with AT&T is up. I hear its 2011 or 2012. If its 2011, I would anticipate a LTE iPhone ithen, if it's 2012, then in 2012. Either way, there will be a considerable LTE infrastructure in Verizon-land in either timeframe. With the fiber to carry the traffic around, HSDPA will be a faster experience than AT&T's version, much less LTE. That's why I say eighteen months, minimum, to an LTE iPhone...because that takes us to 2011.

The other factor affecting their roadmap that we don't know about is when Freescale actually has silicon to start dropping in Apple widgets. Given chipset makers now are bundling every standard possible in their chipsets (Qualcomm Gobi is good example) I wouldn't be surprised if Freescale is working on a uni-chip like that, which lets Apple make a single iPhone that basically can talk to everything by then. Freescale has another input here...if the AT&T contract is up in 2010 (not likely from what I understand, but possible) than Freescale could very well be working on a chipset that lets Apple keep the widget locked down, but talks to every current 3G/3.5G standard). This way they can continue making a single platform for every market, which is something I bet Apple (read Steve) is somewhat manic about maintaining at this point, given his known dispositions.

But those unknown factors are driving that iPhone roadmap. And Verizon is going to have the better network in that long-term. AT&T's strategy is like a road-maker trying to attract drivers by subsidizing cars instead of investing in the road. People will put up with potholes in the road if they get a Mercedes-Benz to do it in. Verizon's the opposite...drive your Honda down a very smooth road. But when they can get the Benzes to sell their drivers, the smooth road will be there and AT&T will still be desperately trying to fill in potholes (like they're trying to do now).

Really? Prove it. Regardless of what they considered, they approached Verizon with a plan.


Because it's another phone that wouldn't have used it. This in itself was not likely to be enough to "scare them off." But, I do think it was at least considered.


Now you're supporting a very questionable point with an even more questionable analogy. The notion that Palm wouldn't have been rescued if Apple went with Verizon is just silly. Let's leave it there.

I dont see how Palm would have been prevented from going with Sprint or perhaps AT&T if Apple went with Verizon. They may have had a better shot since we know Apple would have had to disallow many things that AT&T gave into, thus making the device itself less desirable, which would have pushed the Pre into an even better position for Palm. Why Samab is convinced that Palm would not have had any investors because of the iPhone on Verizon doesnt make any sense to me.

I based my theory on just one thing --- Apple announced their iphone pricing of $600 in the January 2007 keynote. At that time Palm was trying to line up private equity firms to save them and they got rescued in June 2007.

Since Verizon wouldn't have agreed with full priced $600 iphone with a 2 year contract with revenue sharing --- if Apple did sign with Verizon, it would have been a conventional sales model with handset subsidy. It would mean that the first gen iphone would have been priced something like $300-$350. We all know that Verizon ain't nuts, so they weren't going to subsidize the iphone as much as AT&T, so I am not even arguing about a $200 iphone.

So the question becomes --- if Steve Jobs announced that the first gen iphone will be a Verizon exclusive with a price tag of $300-350 with a 2 year contract, would any private equity firm rescue Palm? I don't think so.

And how much was Verizon charging for 5GB of data back then? I doubt that it would have been the $20/month for unlimited that AT&T was charging. The bottom line is that there is absolutely no connection with Palm getting investors and the Pre coming in mid-2009 that has any baring on the carrier Apple paired with.

Those Palm investors didn't know about AT&T's price plans either. Palm was rescued in early June 2007, before AT&T announced any price plans.

http://blog.treonauts.com/2007/06/palm_sells_a_qu.html

You guys were so justified that AT&T was within their right to charge $10 more per month on the 3G iphone because the first gen was running on the much slower 2G network. A Verizon iphone would have been ev-do from the start, so fanbois wouldn't have complained about the $30 a month either.

Again, Apple releasing an iPhone on Verizon that has data on a 3G network off the bat does not mean that Palm would have crumbled. I see nothing that suggests Palm found investors because the iPhone was being released on an EDGE network or that 2 years later these investors expected the iPhone to actually stop selling there 3G phones because the Pre was going to be released. Youve made a lot of claims that Verizon is undoubtedly better for the iPhone than AT&T regardless of what Apple had to due to get Verizon to agree to carry it, but this is just weak sauce.

The most likely answer is that Palm was going to find investors anyway, regardless of the iPhones existence or the carrier it teamed with in the US. Personally, with the iPhone 3G, Im glad I can get voice AND data at the same time. W-CDMA for the win!

I didn't say that iphone on Verizon's 3G network off the bat would do much of anything. I said that iphone on Verizon's 3G network answered your question whether people would complain about $30 a month data plan vs. the AT&T's 2G $20 a month data plan.

I didn't say anyhing about iphone being on EDGE would be much about anything as well.

I said that if Verizon were to sell the iphone from the start --- they would have sold it at the conventional method of handset subsidy. And the price of the iphone would have been announced in January 2007 at maybe $300-350. Would Palm find investors at the environment? It would be much harder and the terms would be much worse.

You don't agree with my theory, I am fine with that. But my comments are a thousand times more reasonable than other people claiming that it was Verizon's biggest mistake to reject the iphone. Verizon Wireless are pretty much unaffected by their lack of the iphone.

All the carriers, sans AT&T for the iPhone, were charging $40-$50 for 5GB to unlimited data per month back then.


There is no connection. Palms investors wouldnt have said, Holy tamales! If only the iPhone wasnt on Verizon. The existence of the iPhone seems to be a catalyst for the investors getting behind WebOS as a competitor. Its the best mobile OS competitor the iPhone has seen and it bests the iPhone OS in some very key ways that I hope Apple copies from in the near future.


I think that Verizon wishes they played ball for the iPhone a little more now and Verizon and the other carriers are certainly affected by the iPhones existence. Try leaving Verizon and telling them that you are going to AT&T for the iPhone. Its kind of desperate. While they are clearly affected, that is not to say that Verizon is greatly affected by it. I think the cost to AT&T for the impact the iPhone has had on their network is more detrimental to AT&T than any loss of users Verizon may have suffered. On top of that, the desire for smartphones and consumer-freidnsly smartphones have increased dramatically since the iPhones arrival.

Yes, I believe that Verizon was charging $45 for a smartphone data plan in 2007. They drop the price to $30 in 2008. Nothing prevents Verizon from dropping that price with their potential iphone launch in 2007.

No, they are not going to say "holy tamales... if only the iphone wasn't on Verizon." They are going to say that "holy tamales... They are going to sell this thing for $300."

Potential Palm investors would have thought the exact same thing as Steve Ballmer did --- that this $600 iphone with a 2 year contract with revenue sharing is the stupidest thing in the world. It ain't going to fly, so I am going to invest in Palm.

And hindsight is 20-20. If Apple didn't insist on $600 iphone with a 2 year contract with revenue sharing --- they would have gotten Verizon as their US partner, they would have gotten their UK, France, Germany launch much earlier and they would have gotten other carriers around the world much earlier. Aside from the original US, UK, France and Germany carriers, none of the other carriers had the revenue sharing in their agreement.

I agree. The carrier Palm wound up with (being Sprint) was a marriage of the weakest. Palm's glory days were mostly with Sprint as their carrier, and they both stumbled badly (Sprint buys Nextel, Palm, well, did its thing) over the past five years or so. Both those companies needed each other, Sprint because they had nothing to differentiate themselves with, and Palm who needed a product stage pretty much devoid of other compelling widgets (who weren't clamoring to Sprint).

I predicted on ComputerWorld back in May that the Pre would be a nifty widget, but Palm being Palm, would basically mail-it-in on a couple of critical factors that would limit their success, and they did: No good API support means most the horsepower in that snazzy TI OMAP CPU goes to waste because its a punk to code on outside of fluffy web languages (especially 3D stuff, read: GAMES stuff). They also don't have the whole content eco-system going for it (despite the initial iTunes sync-ability), and do not have a real plan to get it working from the Palmtop or the desktop, just a bunch of corporate-tool partnerships. Also, deserved or not, Sprint's an infamously bad company on the customer-service front, and they also do retarded things like outsource their network operations to Ericsson (why have an entity named 'Sprint' at that point in the loop? To keep giving Dan Heche checks I guess).

Now it looks like Sprint's going to get snapped up by T-Mobile, and I bet all those franchise network operators that do business as Sprint (but really aren't) will get chowed on by the big CDMA flat-rate regionals (US Cellular, Cricket, MetroPCS, etc.). I have to admit, given the network topology and such I thought Verizon would've gobbled Sprint (they digested Alltel quite well) but there might've been antitrusty issues there, and the franchise thing.

Given that Palm has proven they can execute on the technical side (Pre is very neat, innovative widget) but still such a badly run company, I'm betting either Dell or even the Billy Gator might pick Palm up for a song, now that the stock's coming down from the fanboy-driven highs. The Pre is real though, in good management it could become quite a competitor to the iPhone in what will be the niche proprietary OS world (Android will end up owning the biggest slice of them all in time).