Orange is already a major iPhone player in around 27 different countries, so rolling the Apple handset out to its UK customers isn't a huge undertaking for the provider.
Although
Orange has yet to confirm an official release date, the internet seems to think that on November 10th we'll see the UK's first iPhone competition hit the shops - the day after O2's exclusivity contract with Apple runs out.
"While we haven't yet announced a launch date, we have announced that the iPhone will be available from Orange before Christmas," the company tells
V3, neither confirming nor denying the November 10th rumour. "We look forward to announcing a launch date and pricing plans in the coming weeks."
In preparation, Orange has launched a
preregistration page for the iPhone and iPhone 3GS, which is already believed to have seen over 200,000 people registered their interest.
The general opinion is that none of the companies with the iPhone on their roster (
including Vodafone, which is also expected to have the iPhone on its shelves before Christmas) are
likely to start a price war, since they already subsidise the handset quite heavily.
But that doesn't mean they aren't planning all manner of cunning enticements to bring app hungry users under a
new iPhone contract, the most interesting of which is a rumour that Orange could be planning to send out the Apple handset with preinstalled applications.
It's all still speculation until Orange makes an official announcement, which we can probably expect within the next week or two at the most.
Has anyone here registered their interest or an Orange (or Vodafone, for that matter) iPhone?
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