All Articles Tagged australia

Thanks to reader, Adam R. who wrote in to let us know Australian rates have been revealed, and his Blackberry can now “go the way of the dodo”.

First up is Optus who’ve announced both pre-paid and post-paid plans. Pre-paid Turbo Caps start at AUS$30 for an AUS$30 “mycredit”, AUS$110 “mybonus”, and AUS$30 “mytime money” — but no “mydata”. At AUS$100 you get 100/800/100 and Plus 1GB “mydata”. On these plans, and 8GB iPhone 3G will run you AUS$729 and 16GB, AUS$849. Not confusing enough for non-Ozzies, plan rates weigh in at AUS$0.78/min. for national calls,AUS$0.35 per “Flagfall” call, and AUS$02.2/KB weekdays and AUS$1.1/KB for “iZoo Browsing”.

Read on for Post-paid, Telestra’s first statement, Canadian craziness, and some Swedish relief!

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Crikey! Add 3G speed to the list of beer-brewing, croc-hunting, and bum-booting that Australians claim to do better, stronger, and faster than just about everyone else in the world. Or so an anonymous Telstra exec would have us believe:

“We know what is coming we have seen the new device and it will be available on our network as soon as it is launched in the USA. By Christmas this phone will be capable of 42Mbps which will make it faster than a lot of broadband offerings and the fastest iPhone on any network in the world.”

Hard to believe anyone outside the Jobspod has seen the actual device (remember AT&T hadn’t even seen the first gen model until Macworld 2007), so this one sounds fishy from the get-go.

Also, 42Mbps is jaw-dropping, face-smacking fast, and would pretty much require the next-next gen, tippity-top end HSDPA technology, known as HSDPA+ or HSDPA Evolution. Right now Telstra maxes out at around 14.4 and while they reportedly claimed they will reach 21 by the end of 2008, that’s a far cry from delivering twice that in half the time, which is what making the rumored June iPhone 3G launch would require.

I’m calling shenanigans. What do you think?

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Thanks to eagle-eyed reader Janric for the tip:

Globe’s Head for Consumer Wireless Business Ferdinand Dela Cruz announced today that Globe, SingTel, Bharti Airtel, and Optus have signed an agreement with Apple to bring the iPhone to the Philippines, Singapore, India, and Australia later this year.

Philippines is new, Singapore is now confirmed, and given that Vodafone has already announced Australia and India, this would make it the second and third confirmed non-exclusive territories after Italy.

Score board says:

Okay folks, who’s next?

Figures. Right after I go to all the trouble of cut and pasting together an April iPhone Risk Roundup, Vodafone goes ahead and announces 10 more countries, more than doubling the amount of countries having, or set to have, the iPhone! Apple Insider goes on locations:

“Later this year, Vodafone customers in Australia, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, Portugal, New Zealand, South Africa and Turkey will be able to purchase the iPhone for use on the Vodafone network,” the carrier said in a statement without providing further detail.

A look at our newly overpopulated score board:

Vodofone, of course, owns Verizon in the US, which is rumored to have taken a pass on Apple’s iPhone, leading to the current AT&T exclusivity deal. Back with a vengeance much?

Like the Canadian detail-free announcement from Rogers, it’s also likely these deals will involve the as-yet-unannounced-but-widely-expected 3G iPhone, though given the rest of the world’s 3G-centricity, it certainly should. Also unknown is whether these will be the exclusive deals involving revenue sharing and pressure towards unlimited data plans Apple pioneered with the initial iPhone launch last year.

What do you think?

(PS - Apple, help a blogger out and release more of your little flag circle icons. Those things don’t Photoshop themselves, b’okay?)

No, that’s not spring in the air, that’s the rumor frenzy ramp-up to Apple’s June World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC), and here’s the aptly titled MacRumors with a mother load:

A MacRumors reader ran across a very unusual .Mac web page yesterday and was kind enough to forward it on. The page contained promotional images for Apple products [...] including teasers for iTunes 8, a 32GB iPhone [in Australia!], and a WWDC launch date (June 10th).

Turns out, not so much. The images came courtesy of one of MacRumors own forum members (though MacRumors continues to maintain they were associated with a legit @apple.com account).

In general, a 32GB iPhone, at least for the current generation product, would require a 32GB NAND chip for the single slot (due to the cell radio and other components, unlike the iPod Touch which boasts 2 NAND slots, the iPhone only has room for 1 — hence iPod Touch always offering twice the memory). If true, it may explain the price cuts on the 8GB models. iTunes 8 would only require some boosted features (App Store support?) and Apple’s marketing desire to bump the rev a full number. Australia rumors have been building for a long time now, of course.

Also included were the first MacBook and MacBookPro case revs, going to aluminum and iMac-style black on aluminum respectively. (Both of which have also seen rampant rumor ramp ups — say that ten times fast!)

Ars Technica brings word that Australia may just be giving Singapore, the Netherlands, and Mexico a run for their international money in the great race towards the 7th official iPhone launch.

If rumors are to be believed, resellers have been told to say g’day to an UNLOCKED 3G iPhone down-under come the end of June. This would bring our current score to:

Without an Apple retail presence or strong carrier-branded stores, resellers are said to be key in getting the device out to market in Oz, and Apple COO, Tim Cook did say they would be open to different business models, but UNLOCKED?! And 3G in June?

Personally, I hope this is true as unlocked may be the only way we’ll get an iPhone in Canada any time soon (though 3G will do little good if it’s $1K a month…), but I’m taking this with a kangaroo-sized grain of salt for now… What do you think?