Apple’s plans to take over the entire known smartphone universe continue with the news that Tesco will soon be carrying the iconic iPhone handset.
At the moment there’s only a page inviting consumers to register their interest and a short press release:
Tesco Mobile through its joint venture partnership with O2 is pleased to announce that it will shortly introduce iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS in Tesco Phone Shops and online through Tesco Direct in the UK.
For further information and for customers interested in pre-registration please visit www.tescomobileiphone.com.
For more information on iPhone, please visit www.apple.com/iphone.
More information can be found on Tesco Mobile at www.tescomobile.com
We’ll post up more info when we get it.
[thanks to P for the tip]
The interesting thing is going to be how the data charges are structured for this.
Currently Tesco Mobile charges £4 a megabyte for data (yes that’s FOUR QUID A MEGABYTE!!), with no bundles or other discounts available. If they continue with that policy, the Iphone is effectively going to be a very expensive brick.
The other interesting thing will be the pricing of the phone itself. Currently Tesco only do PAYG phones and SIM only monthly deals. So will Tesco offer a new monthly tariff for the Iphone, or will it be PAYG only?
agreed..iPhone is useless without an unlimited data deal. It would also be a PR disaster for them as customers got hit with huuuuge bills..so hopefully they will think of that.
Apologies, I understand unlimited browsing *is* now available for £2 a week on PAYG.
Not sure how that will relate to the IPhone.
Apparently this is a deal with O2, they’ll be using O2’s infrastructure from what I can tell. So much for that much needed price war then…
Tesco is a ‘virtual operator’ over the O2 network. They buy airtime from O2 in bulk and sell it on to folks.
The issue is going to be the price of the handset, which presumably will be negotiated directly with Apple rather than set by O2 (or am I wrong?)