Sample this conversation over IM with Amitabh last week:
Amitabh: u know apple shd come up with an offer that they will pay for all early terminations
Amitabh: people who wanna get the iphone but r not on att
Amitabh: u can only imagine the business that wd bring to att
Amitabh: ;)
Kunal: why do that when people will willingly pay themselves and come to them!
Amitabh: :)
Turns out, I wasn’t way off the mark as John Gruber linked to this:
Interpret’s survey also bodes well for AT&T. Half the buyers switched from another carrier. Of those, 35% paid an average $167 to break a contract.
167 dollars average to break the contract – that’s a third of the cost of the 4 GB iPhone, not a trivial amount by any means.
Obviously, people want it, and want it bad – and that’s because their current phones suck. Considering all expenses (phone + activation + commitment + early termination, if any), an iPhone will set you back by around 2000 USD over 2 years – if you stay within the “free minutes” or whatever they call it in the US.
It might be the “most expensive phone in the world” – but the customers are happy to pay for it and Apple + AT&T are obviously happy with it’s success. Everybody wins? Try telling that to Steve Ballmer.
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