John Gruber on iPhone coming to Verizon
daringfireball.net
daringfireball.net
Most people don't know anything about Verizon's phone testing process.
It is, by far, the best in the business. Verizon does not ship non-functional products.
However, clearing the typical telco operator handset testing process (network testing, stress testing, etc) takes 3-6 months.
Verizon takes 18 months. They are the most thorough in the business. This is well known in that community.
They (V&A) have a CDMA iPhone. It's in a Verizon lab somewhere. No one knows if it's passing handset testing (it may not be), or if the deal is fouled up on the sales/bd front.
I suspect Apple and Verizon cannot agree to contract terms, largely around branding on the phone.
And wouldn't that mean that on Verizon you would get the same phone that is sold on AT&T (or around the world) one year later? Or is the manufacturer supposed to wait one year after AT&T has approved it but Verizon hasn't, and cannot even sell it to AT&T?
Sorry, you seem to know what you are talking about, could you explain your point a bit better? Thanks.
There are direct relationships between the spend on QA and testing early in the process to the spend on customer support later.
2) Different large carriers typically get different phone variants. See, for instance, the Samsung Galaxy. In many cases, because of the CDMA/GSM issue, Verizon gets a wholly different phone than AT&T.
Each carrier has a different strategy and is looking for different things. Many carriers even have specific product managers for each carrier, ensuring the phone is in line w/ their unique requirements.
Because of their size and clout, Verizon gets theirs earlier than most (I think - not sure on this).
Exclusivity arrangements are negotiated between the OEM and the carrier. Generally you're working with lots of different SKUs that are relatively similar.
The iPhone turns most of this on its ear, in both a) there's one, and b) Apple is not good at working with other companies, because only one person at Apple's opinion matters. Verizon is also famously difficult to work with and used to dictating terms to partners, generally around making all of the mobile content 'V-Cast' this or that, and putting their logo on everything.
As you can see, there are conflicts. I imagine they've been working on them.
Oh, and as a side note, since I've moved out of San Francisco, I have had 0 problems with my iPhone.
Is that a helpful response?
It was still not very convincing for the time length though. We are not talking of Verizon getting a phone a few months earlier but a full year.
At that point most chips are not even out yet, nor is the Android OS, etc... 18 months before release seems WAY too long.
many OEMs have unique product managers for each carriers...
Personally I've decided to hold off on the iPhone 4 and will instead pick up the new iTouch when it drops this fall. Maybe when I have carrier choice I'll reconsider an iPhone.