Were you looking forward to picking up a brand spanking new Nexus 4 smartphone today? You may have been lucky, but chances are, you probably weren’t thanks to sell-outs and ordering issues worldwide.
Google’s latest entry into the Android smartphone market and next handset to feature the Nexus moniker went on sale today, and apparently it’s rather popular. So popular in fact that the handset sold out all over the place, and in fairly short order, too.
The phone, released today around in multiple territories, is manufactured by LG but bears the Nexus brand, the first time LG has been the company to get in on the Nexus bandwagon. If early reports are any indication, it seems this may be something of a real hit for LG, and one very much needed.
So how popular has the Nexus 4 (that’s what they called it, by the way) proved to be? Well, the handset sold out on Google’s Play Store within just 50 minutes of being made available, according to reports. It’s been a similar story elsewhere, with German customers snapping up Google’s full stock in just 15 minutes. Of course, we don’t know how large that stock was, but it’s still promising news for both Google and LG. Things haven’t all been plain sailing, though.
Potential buyers in the UK, for example, found that Google’s systems were unable to cope with demand, and orders found themselves stuck in limbo. Items were in users’ baskets, but unable to be checked out. So close, yet so far!
As of right now, it would appear that stocks are trickling into the Google Play Store across the Nexus 4 and both Nexus tablets, but it’s still very much a hit and miss affair. It’s not really the best way to handle a big hardware release, but we suspect Google will spin the situation as a positive due to the perceived huge demand. We don’t blame them, and it just goes to show that a SIM-free, unlocked flagship phone will sell when priced at just $299. Apparently the lack of an LTE didn’t affect demand after all. Who could have guessed that?
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