O2 To Launch The iPhone In Ireland

Apple’s UK cellular partner O2 confirmed the launch of the iPhone in Ireland for March 14, 2008. As in the UK, the iPhone will be available through O2 retail stores and through Carphone Warehouse.Pricing is similar to other European countries, the 8GB iPhone will cost €399 and the 16GB iPhone will sell for €499; a variety of monthly plans are also available.

The rate plans will begin at €45/month for 175 minutes, 100 SMSs, and 1GB of data up through €100/month for 700 minutes, 250 SMSs, and 1GB of data. Interestingly, there appears to be no mention of Visual Voicemail this time around.

"The iPhone is changing the way people use their mobiles forever, and we're thrilled to offer it to O2 customers in Ireland. Our strategy in Ireland continues to be to bring our customers the very best innovations and experiences in mobile communications." - O2 Ireland CEO, Danuta Gray said.

In its fiscal first quarter Apple sold over 2.3 million iPhones, bringing the total number of units sold to 4 million since its launch in June 2007.

"For 2007 O2 has delivered a strong set of results adding 3.04 million mobile customers during the year and over 1 million in the fourth quarter alone, taking the total mobile customer base to 38.26 million, 8.6% higher than last year. Non-SMS data revenue is growing fast with €680 million recorded in 2007; growth of 26% year on year, and this trend will accelerate in 2008" - Matthew Key, Chairman and Chief Executive of Telefónica Europe commented.

That's not all the 1.1.4 firmware revealed in advance, though. T-Mobile Austria was also found in the iPhone's list of supported carriers. The latest finding makes even more sense when combined with comments by T-Mobile's CEO that the company would be offering the iPhone in Austria sometime in the first half of 2008.

P.S. Since O2 has already announced its plans, perhaps it won't be much longer before T-Mobile does the same.

References:
http://www.macdailynews.com/index.php/weblog/comments/o2_to_sell_apple_iphone
_exclusively_in_ireland_starting_march_14/
http://www.macworld.com/article/132291/2008/02/ireland.html

Google Reveals High iPhone Web Use

Google has revealed it has seen 50 times more search requests coming from Apple iPhones than any other mobile handset.

The figures were so high that the search company initially thought they had made an error compiling the data.

"We thought it was a mistake and made our engineers check the logs again", - Vic Gundotra, head of Google's mobile operations told the Financial Times during this week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

American iPhone operator AT&T recently said that the average revenue from iPhone users is double that of average users because the of top-up data packages, while in the UK O2 has said the iPhone is generating "unheard of data traffic".

The iPhone offers "full-fat" internet with Apple's Safari browser, rather than web designed especially for a mobile phone format.

O2 To Boost Business By Slashing The Costs Of iPhone

With all the coverage about Apple ‘allegedly’ gagging its UK partners from not revealing poor iPhone sales figures, it’s not surprising to see that O2 is hoping to boost business by slashing the cost of running Apple’s stylish device.

O2 has taken the wraps off a new tariff structure that will apply to new users and – get this – existing customer too. How generous. Either that or they’re merely sidestepping the media shit-storm that would ensue if they ignored those ever-faithful early adopters.

Entry-level £35 per month owners now get their call allowance tripled to 600 minutes and texts boosted to 500 minutes. Those paying £45 now get the £55 package with 1,200 minutes of calls and 500 monthly texts. The £55 per month package is being replaced by an uber-caller £75 per month package for 3,000 minutes of calls and 500 texts.

Here’s the official statement and details:

*Existing £35 iPhone customers

We will be automatically upgrading you to the new £35 iPhone tariff which offers you 600 anytime minutes and 500 anytime texts a month. You will also continue to receive unlimited* UK data. All of this will be done for you without you having to do a thing and we'll text you to let you know when it's been done.

* Existing £45 iPhone customers

We will be automatically upgrading you to the new £45 iPhone tariff which offers you 1,200 anytime minutes and 500 anytime texts a month. You will also continue to receive unlimited* UK data.

*Existing £55 iPhone customers

We will be reducing the price of your 1,200 anytime minute iPhone tariff from £55 to £45. You will continue to get 500 anytime texts and unlimited* UK data at this new price.

The deal with The Cloud for free Wi-Fi and unlimited data use remains unchanged. Smart move, but will it boost sales?

iPhone 'fails to live up to hype' in Britain

The long-awaited iPhone has failed to match the hype with sales of Apple’s ground breaking gadget falling short of expectations.

Mobile network giant O2, which is the only network provider in the UK for the handset, sold 190,000 for the first eight weeks from the iPhone’s launch in November - 10,000 short of the figures it predicted, according to the Financial Times.

02 had anticipated selling 200,000 iPhones in the first two months, but analysts predicted the sales would be far higher after pre-launch hype led to expectations that the £269 phone would quickly become a best seller like its iconic iPod predecessors.

But the high price tag and restrictions on using the phone on just a single network is thought to have put many consumers off buying the ground-breaking touch sensitive mobile phone.

Customers buying the phone were required to take out an 18 month contract at £35 a month, facing an outlay of £899.

Apple also released software updates in a bid to prevent people from having their iPhones "chipped", which allowed them to use the phone on other networks.

O2 has insisted that the iPhone has attracted "unprecedented levels of customer satisfaction" and said the iPhone was its fastest ever selling handset.

It also said that the device had triggered a three-fold increase in the number of people visiting its stores in the past two months.

Consumer technology analysts Gartner, however, had predicted in November that sales of the iPhone could reach up to 400,000 in the first two months.

The first weekend of iPhone sales sparked fears that uptake would be disappointing after UK stores failed to attract the long queues seen outside retailers in the United States when the phone was launched there earlier in the summer.

Apple chief Steve Jobs this week revealed that the company has sold more than 4 million iPhones worldwide - an average of 20,000 iPhones a day.

Speaking at Apple’s technology showcase MacWorld Expo, he also announced new software, including an upgraded location detection feature, in a bid to attract more customers.

Apple and O2 have both declined to comment on iPhone sales figures in the UK.

The O2 figures come as Carphone Warehouse, which has also been selling the iPhone in its stores, reported disappointing sales figures over the Christmas period.

It reported an 11 per cent rise in connections of all mobile phones compared to the anticipated 15 per cent.

No Signal Bars on iPhone in UK?

"UK 02 (poor signal strength/reception problems) is a title of one of the threads that has recently appeared on Apple's discussion forum.

It turns out that many customers in UK experience severe problem with poor signal / reception on their iPhones.

The first complain appeared on November 11, 2007. That is two days after the device was officially launched in UK.

A customer nicknamed Darkzoo writes:

Yes, my signal is mostly 'No Service', with the occasional one bar, despite
showing coverage on the O2 site - gutted.
In the past, visiting friends with
O2 have had a poor signal here, but better than I am getting.
Mandy

Yet another user writes:

Same here. Been on Orange for 15 years and bought iPhone on Saturday with O2.
Never been unable to get a signal here with Orange but have only managed one bar
on rare occassons on the iPhone in 48 hrs. Is this a fault with the phone or do
O2 simply not have as good a coverage as Orange?

You can view the forum thread here. By the way, it is very active, which means that there are increasingly more people experiencing the problem.

iPhone's European Debut - Day 1

Apple has made a fantastic European debut. UK's O2 is reporting 8,000 activations and Germany's T-Mobile is doing even better with 10,000 activations on the very first date. Not the same as on June 29th, however, European figures are still very good for the Cupertino company. For example, O2 was planning 3,000 activations on the first day.

You can read more detailed reports on ars technica both about O2 and about T-Mobile sales.