It’s been a long time coming, but according to an official announcement from Deutsche Telekom CEO Rene Obermann (and following last week’s analyst predictions), T-Mobile will finally begin selling Apple products in 2013 – and it doesn’t take much reading between the lines to say that really means the iPhone (and perhaps the iPad).
For the past 6 generations of the iPhone, T-Mobile has been the only major U.S. carrier left out from offering Apple’s iconic smartphone. The news was revealed during the company’s intestors’ day meetings today, where Mr. Obermann was quoted as saying that T-Mobile and Apple have finally reached an agreement to “launch Apple products in the U.S. in 2013.”
From the press release:
[…] T-Mobile USA has entered into an agreement with Apple to bring products to market together in 2013.
The timing makes a great deal of sense – previously, the iPhone was not offered on T-Mobile’s U.S. network due to network incompatibility – T-Mobile uses a unique frequency for their 3G data that isn’t compatible with GSM networks or CDMA networks, such as AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon.
In the past couple of years, T-Mobile has put a great deal of effort into enhancing their network with iPhone-friendly HSPA+ 3G. They’ve also been unabashedly pushing that fact into Apple’s face, and even launched an iPhone-ready T-Mobile hotspot at WWDC last year. Now that most of their network is capable of supporting the iPhone, it only makes sense that they should have the opportunity to offer the device to their customers.
