Apple Defends AT&T on Eve of Breakup?

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Screen shot 2010-01-26 at 9.24.08 PM

Apple COO Tim Cook reaffirmed their allegiance to AT&T on Monday during a quarterly earnings conference call. Apple Insider is reporting he went so far as to downplay multiple carriers. “First of all, AT&T is a great partner,” Cook said. “We’ve been working with them since well before we announced the first iPhone. It’s important to note they have more mobile broadband usage than any carrier in the world.”
“We think iPhone customers are having a great experience from the research we’ve done,” Cook added.
“AT&T has acknowledged they’re having a few issues in a few cities and they’re making plans to address these. We’ve reviewed these plans and we’re confident they’ll make significant progress towards fixing them.” Legions of disgruntled iPhone customers would probably protest these remarks vociferously. To the point that AT&T has taken a hit on their image.

However a new rumour has surfaced via Hot Hardware that the exclusivity will indeed be broken on Wednesday, January 27. Apparently the contract was up January 1, 2010. Interestingly it is not so much Apple, as it is AT&T wanting to let in another provider so as to preserve their image as a reliable carrier. The iPhone is triggering network overloads for AT&T now. Just imagine what kind of overload the New Creation will generate once it hits the ground in March. AT&T could use this offloading as time for damage control within their own network. Indeed, there are rumblings that Verizon has been called to arms and will announce a partnership with Apple at a webcast for Verizon dealers which will run simultaneously with Apple’s big announcement tomorrow. Maybe even an exclusive agreement which will see only Verizon handle the Latest Creation. Tomorrow is shaping up to be a big big day for mobile tech fans everywhere!

This is an article by The Apps Machine.