According to an “anonymous tipster”, Spanish phone carrier Telefonica, which currently carries the iPhone 4, will be pulling it off the shelves starting on August 22nd, presumably in order to prepare for an upcoming iPhone.
Indeed, according to this source, the carrier will be fully out of iPhones by September 12th, in the month when Apple is rumored to announce a brand-new iPhone, presumably the iPhone 5 we’ve been hearing so much about. This source appears to have no doubt that a new product will indeed replace the current iPhone 4 shortly after it’s been phased out completely.
[This move] will of course prepare us for the launch of a new smart phone.
Despite being based in Spain, Telefonica owns operations and has customers all over the world, primarily in Latin America. Furthermore, it also owns O2, the well-known British cellular network which was the first to ever carry the iPhone in the United Kingdom, way back in 2007. While it’s still unclear whether the latter will also begin pulling inventory like its parent company, doing so will be logical in order to get potential customers to use new hardware instead.
According to recent rumors, the next iPhone will be announced by Apple at a media event next month and launch it almost immediately in the United States. The same phone will then be released in most major countries, such as Canada and the UK, in October. If you’re planning to specifically buy an iPhone 4 through Telefonica, you you should do it now, since there might not be any left in the latter half of next month: in fact, perhaps no iPhone at all. It’s impossible to predict how much this 3-week window will hurt Apple’s international iPhone market share, but due to the company’s excellent marketing and customer reach, most customers will likely hold off for a few weeks and wait for the iPhone 5 instead of just buying a product from a competitor.
The next-generation iPhone is expected to sport enhanced hardware, much needed at the moment since the iPhone 4 is already 1 year old and not up to par with its competitors, in terms of some hardware aspects that is. A dual A5 processor is expected, as opposed to the A4 that powers the current iPhone, as well as a higher-resolution camera and larger screen. Hold off, the wait will be worth it.
(via Engadget)
You can follow us on Twitter or join our Facebook fanpage to keep yourself updated on all the latest from Microsoft, Google and Apple.
