World of Apple

MacDailyNews has republished an internal AT&T memo which states that the iPhone 3GS launch day created the best sales day ever in AT&T’s retail stores.

1. Fact of the Week: On June 25, the day Michael Jackson died, text messages sent on our network spiked at 65,000 messages per second — the largest volume ever recorded — surpassing events like American Idol voting and New Year’s Eve, when millions of our customers wish their friends and family a happy new year via text.”

2. “iLaunch day 2009 was one for the record books, as AT∓T customers scrambled to get their hands on the fastest, most powerful iPhone yet.

Here’s a look at some of the milestones we achieved:

* Best-ever sales day in our retail stores
* Second-largest traffic day in our retail stores
* Most transactions processed via our IT systems in a single day
* Most upgrade eligibility checks in a single day
* Largest order day in att.com history
* Largest features sales day in att.com history

On this year’s launch day, iPhone sales exceeded sales recorded on 2008’s iPhone launch day, Black Friday 2008 and Dec. 26, 2008 — all heavy-volume sales days. In fact, this year we surpassed 2008’s launch day sales at about noon Central time, and sustained our previous peak hour record, also set in 2008, for 11 straight hours.

AT&T has put together a guide on how to obtain an iPhone 3GS tomorrow. The iPhone 3GS will be available at over 2,200 AT&T locations on launch day as well as the 211 Apple Retail Stores in the USA.

All AT&T stores will open at 7 a.m. local time to serve pre-order customers but be sure to check your confirmation email as some units are not due to arrive until after June 19. Anyone who hasn’t pre-ordered can turn up during normal business hours and will be served on a “first come, first served” basis.

Customers new to AT&T who wish to transfer their current number to AT&T should bring a copy of a bill from their current carrier. Customers will be asked to provide account information as it appears on record with their current provider, including:

• Account number
• Name of the account holder
• Account holder’s Social Security Number or Tax ID
• Billing address
• PIN or password (if applicable)

AT&T will initially only sell one iPhone 3GS to every new customer.

AT&T today announced that it is expanding the eligibility window for customers who wish to upgrade to the iPhone 3GS. Customer who would have previously not been eligible for upgrade until July, August or September will now be eligible on June 18th.

All of that said, we’ve been listening to our customers. And since many of our iPhone 3G customers are early adopters and literally weeks shy of being upgrade eligible due to iPhone 3GS launching 11 months after iPhone 3G, we’re extending the window of upgrade eligibility for a limited time.

We’re now pleased to offer our iPhone 3G customers who are upgrade eligible in July, August or September 2009 our best upgrade pricing, beginning Thursday, June 18.

If you’re one of the many customers who will benefit from this change, please note that our upgrade eligibility tools will reflect this change on Thursday, June 18.

Those who are now eligible for AT&T’s lowest upgrade pricing will be able to purchase an iPhone 3GS for $199 (16 GB) or $299 (32 GB).

Customers who are now eligible but had already pre-ordered an iPhone will receive a credit for the price difference.

AT&T is considering lower cost plans for the iPhone and other smartphones by setting a cap on the amount of data used in a given month.

The comments come direct from AT&T’s CEO, Ralph de la Vega who said at the Reuters Global Technology Summit last week that he could see AT&T capping data in return for lower costs.

“Right now we continue to study what is the best thing that is available, not just from an iPhone point of view, but what you can do to stimulate additional demand,” de la Vega said at the Technology Summit.

The remarks come not long after reports that AT&T is looking into offering a $20 per month iPhone plan that would give iPhone owners $10 a month in savings but see a data cap put in place.

According to Cote Collaborative analyst Michael Cote there is a “strong possibility” that AT&T will drop the entry-level iPhone tariff price by $10.

The $10 price drop would bring the price of the tariff down from $69 to $59, a saving of $120/year. The move is said to be announced at next months Worldwide Developers Conference where Apple is expected to unveil a new iPhone.

Commenting on the current price of an iPhone over a two-year contract, Cotes said:

“This price does not address the whole market,” says Cote. And the price barrier has started to be a concern for Apple. For example, says Cote, “Wal-Mart iPhone sales haven’t met expectations.”

AT&T the official carrier of the iPhone in North America announced today along with its fiscal first quarter results that it had activated more than 1.6 million iPhones during the quarter.

The company which also reported a “1.2 million net gain in total wireless subscribers to reach 78.2 million” said that of the 1.6 million iPhone 3G activations 40-percent of those customers were new to the company.

Randall Stephenson, AT&T chairman and chief executive officer said in a statement; “I am particularly pleased with the success of our iPhone 3G initiative, which has driven strong high-end customer growth and delivered financial benefits ahead of our original outlook. Business and consumer expectations for mobility are on the rise, wireless innovation is flourishing and the opportunities ahead are substantial. AT&T is strongly positioned to lead in the next generation of wireless growth.”

Apple will announce its fiscal second quarter 2009 results later on today.

A report from Telephony Online suggests that Apple’s official carrier of the iPhone in the USA is in the midst of upgrading its network to double the current capacity.

The report states that AT&T is making tweaks to its current HSPA network which will bring the capacity up to 7.2Mbps.

AT&T is increasing the downlink capacity on its high-speed packet access (HSPA) from 3.6 megabits per second to 7.2 Mb/s through software upgrades at the base station, said Scott McElroy, AT&T Mobility vice president of technology realization.

The report goes onto add that AT&T will be looking to implement HSPA+ which will be capable of speeds up to 21Mbps.

Following yesterdays rumour AT&T has confirmed that it will start selling iPhones without requiring a two-year contract, but they will cost $400 more.

Spokesman Michael Coe said AT&T will sell the phones starting next Thursday for $599 or $699, depending on the storage capacity. The two models cost $199 or $299 under contract.

The phone company had said in July, when the latest version of the iPhone was launched, that it would sell contract-free phones in the United States. Such phones are sold in some other countries.

The new phones will still be “locked” to AT&T and won’t work with any other cellular carrier unless they’re modified. AT&T will only activate them on the regular iPhone plans, which include a $30 monthly charge for data access. Prepaid service will not be available.

Boy Genius Report is claiming that starting March 26 AT&T will being offering iPhone 3Gs contract-free to existing customers. The information which appears to have been sourced from internal AT&T training material which states that the 8GB iPhone 3G will sell for $599 and the 16GB for $699.

The training materials go on to explain that customers purchasing no-commit iPhones will be limited to one purchase.

Earlier this week AT&T reported its fourth quarter fiscal results for 2008, in the announcement Apple’s official iPhone carrier in the United States said that it had activated 1.9 million iPhones during the quarter. The numbers are down from 2.4 million activations in AT&Ts third quarter but the activations as a while have played a key role in AT&Ts growth.

AT&Ts CEO Randall Stephenson attributed iPhone sales as reason why AT&T fought the economy to report revenues up 2.4% (to $31.1 billion).

“The success of our iPhone 3G launch has driven wireless growth and helped redefine the wireless data space.”

Fortune offers some analysis of Apple’s deal with AT&T and in particular what has caused such growth for AT&T in 2008.

AT&T has activated 4.3 million iPhone 3Gs since its launch, 1.9 million in Q4 alone — more than double its iPhone activations one year earlier.
The average revenue from Phone users is 60% higher than the typical AT&T customer — thanks to that $30 per month data fee. Their heavy use of Web services helped drive AT&T wireless data use up 51.2% year to year, which as reader Jon in Brentwood, Calif., points out is not necessarily a good thing.
About 40% of the iPhone activations this quarter were new AT&T customers, either buying their first cellphone or switching from another carrier.
The churn rate — the percentage of customers who drop AT&T’s service — among iPhone owners is significantly lower than the rest of the network, sharply reducing marketing costs.