Orange's Apple deal to bear unlocked iPhones
French law bites Mac maker, again
Orange will indeed offer Apple's iPhone on France, but the most interesting aspect of the two firms' partnership will be the availability, for the first time, of officially unlocked handsets.
French law prevents carriers from tying handsets exclusively to their networks - consumers have to be able to move to a different network provider and take their phones with them. The upshot is that Orange will sell a locked iPhone for €399 alongside an unlocked model for a price that's yet to be specified by either party.
Apple's tie-up with Orange was revealed back in August, but while the iPhone maker's partnerships with O2 in the UK and T-Mobile in Germany were announced to the public the following month, as expected, the Orange arrangement has taken longer to finalise than was anticipated.
Orange, these days part of France Telecom, was adamant that the time had been spent haggling over the commercial details of the arrangement and had nothing to do with unlocking the iPhone.
However, the arrangement is a tricky one for Apple. What can it do to stop, say, British or German punters popping to Paris to pick up a SIM-free iPhone? Since its deals with O2 and T-Mobile are believed to be founded on taking a cut of the money the networks make from iPhone users, that's not an outcome Apple will be happy with.
That said, we don't know how much more Apple and Orange will charge for the unlocked iPhone or how readily available it will be. It's not hard to imagine Apple obeying the letter or the law but not its spirit by charging, say, twice as much for the unlocked iPhone as the tethered one.
The price of the unlocked iPhone, along with the cost of the contract attached to the locked version, will be announced in November, Orange said.
COMMENTS
If Jobs had any cojones...
He'd team up with Google to get the 700Ghz band unlocked and then produce a phone system that would bypass the major carriers entirely. That is the technology that will make me run, not walk, to buy it. In fact, I'd even buy that sort of technology from Microsoft (gasp!). Microsoft may be evil, but they look pretty good compared to the US telephone carriers...
@ Vincent Himpe
As a user of a Windows Mobile Device myself... I dont know how you havent hit any of the bugs I see... Often the start button doesn't draw itself properly (Oh, the word "start" is there, but the windows icon isn't, and hitting start does naught), Using google maps means the screen doesn't turn off properly. The phone sometimes crashes when the alarm goes off, and some users have reported for no reason at all, calendar appointments stop actualy making a reminder appear, despite it being turned on to emit one.
Stay away from these buggy devices, at all costs.
@Tom Hawkins
Tom,
I don't recall saying anything to the contrary. Nor do I recall being 'hysterical'. I'll wait for you to make your point.
Chinese Clones
Where are the chinese clones ?
--
They are here in south east asia mate for about 50 quid
As long as..
As long as the predicitive dictionary isn't French so I don't have to text in French then I'm going to switch the language on my mobile and start training.
