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Apple’s iPhone Sparks Conflicting View From Deutsche Telekom Boss

Apple’s iPhone Sparks Conflicting View From Deutsche Telekom Boss

There must be something magic about Apple’s iPhone. Not just that customers camp overnight outside shops in the scramble to get hold of the latest device first. It seems the gadget has led to Deutsche Telekom boss Rene Obermann to voice a different view on it–depending on which side of the Atlantic he is talking about.

Take Germany–after three years’ exclusivity, peers Vodafone and Telefonica’s o2 started to sell the iPhone  last week. Obermann proudly said Deutsche Telekom sold  400,000 iPhones in the third quarter, more than in any other quarter.

But he doesn’t care much about the new competition in Europe’s largest economy.

“The smartphone market today is totally different from what it used to be two or three years ago. Today we have a whole series of very attractive handsets from different manufacturers in our line-up.”

But it’s the same Obermann who blames the missing iPhone in the U.S. for continously high churn rates among Deutsche Telekom’s contract subscribers. If the iPhone isn’t just an advance argument to distract analysts and investors from deeper structural problems at the former cash cow, as is a likelihood, Deutsche Telekom will run into further trouble anyway.

AT&T is iPhone’s exclusive U.S. carrier right now, with so-far unconfirmed reports that rival Verizon Wireless  could also be in line to get the device, potentially putting more pressure on T-Mobile in the U.S.

If you thought there was an app for pretty much everything these days, it sems this is not the case for Deutsche Telekom in the U.S.

[Thanks: http://blogs.wsj.com]

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