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Hot on the heels of Verizon's announcement on Tuesday that it will begin to offer an Apple iPhone 4 on its CDMA network on February 10 comes word that a CDMA iPad is also in the works.

According to Bloomberg, Verizon Communications CFO Francis Shammo has said that Apple will provide Verizon Wireless with an iPad that has its CDMA goodness inside, obviating the need for Verizon's external – and, at $269.99 with month-to-month service, pricey – MiFi 2200 Mobile Hotspot.

Verizon currently offers the MiFi 2200 in bundles with Apple's "magical and revolutionary" fondleslab for $629.99 (16GB), $729.99 (32GB), and $829.99 (64GB).

Unfortunately, that's just about all that Shammo said. He didn't reveal when such an iPad would become available, or whether it'd be a new version of the exisiting first-generation iPad, whether it'd arrive when the oft-rumored next-gen iPad appears, or whether CDMA capability will arrive in the form of a dual-mode CDMA-cum-GSM "World iPad", rumored since late last year.

Verizon, by the way, wouldn't be the only large-scale beneficiary of a CDMA-capable iPad. Chinese CDMA carrier China Telecom may not be number-one in the Middle Kingdom, but with 83 million total subcribers as of last September – behind China Mobile's 580 million and China Unicom's 152 million – its revenue possibilities are not exactly chickenfeed.

AT&T is currently the only iPad provider in the US with 3G service – as it was the only iPhone supplier until Tuesday morning. The release of a CDMA-capable iPad – whether dual-mode or not – would certainly not be happy news for the number-two US wireless provider and erstwhile iPhone hegemon.

Verizon Wireless did not respond to our requests for confirmation of Shammo's remarks, nor for clarification of when the CDMA iPad might be available, or what model might include that capability. ®

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