Last month, we found out that U.S. Cellular - the sixth largest carrier in the United States refused to carry the iPhone due to Apple's terms which the company found "unacceptable". It was revealed by US Cellular's CEO Mary Dillon.
Fierce Wireless reports that while
speaking at the UBS 39th Annual Global Media and Communications
Conference, TDS (parent to U.S. Cellular) CEO Ted Carlson has this
excuse to give why U.S Cellular does not offer Apple's iPhone:
“We’re never
going to say never about the iPhone. The iPhone for us would need to be
at the cutting edge of where we’re going, and then there might be an
opportunity to consider it.” [..]
[..] Speaking at
the UBS Global Media and Communications Conference, Carlson said the
company is currently more concerned with launching its forthcoming LTE
network and signing customers up for LTE service than selling the
iPhone. He said that U.S. Cellular's top priority is launching LTE,
lining up companies to provide LTE devices and then migrating customers
to the service to give them a better experience and reduce network
costs.
U.S. Cellular is the second "regional" carrier with which Apple was in talks with to carry the iPhone. The first was C Spire, which started selling the iPhone from November 11th.
While the reason given by US Cellular's
CEO last month seemed reasonable, the reason given by Carlson for not
carrying Apple's iPhone seems more like a case of sour grapes as U.S.
Cellular is expected to cover only 25 percent of its footprint with LTE
by year-end and expects to complete the full LTE buildout in three
years.
Apple is widely speculated to launch a 4G LTE iPhone in 2012
when 4G LTE networks have wider coverage. It will be interesting to see
if U.S. Cellular will start offering that version of the iPhone or come
up with another excuse.
What do you think about TDS CEO's comments?
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