14 DAY TRIAL // Vodafone just unveiled, in a very short announcement made public on its website, that it will bring Apple's iPhone to no less than 10 new markets from all around the world. Therefore, it is now officially confirmed that the iPhone will be released in the following countries: India, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Turkey, Egypt, Greece, the Czech Republic, Italy and Portugal.
There are no details about when exactly the iPhone will hit these markets, but the giant carrier mentions something about "later this year", which basically means anytime from now to December 31. Vodafone has a total of about 150 million subscribers in the above mentioned countries, directly or via partnerships, so Apple should expect to sell an important number of iPhones in the near future.
In case you didn't realize, Vodafone doesn't talk about the 3G iPhone in the newly issued announcement, but about the 2.5G one. And since the 3G one should be released somewhere during the summer, it means that both versions of the sleek touchscreen handset will have high sales at the same time. This ultimately translates into more revenue for Apple, which I'm not sure if it's a good or a bad thing.
In Australia, where the iPhone is expected before it is even launched in the US, Vodafone is not among the leading mobile carriers, as it only has about 3.6 million subscribers - not much when compared to Telstra (more than 9 million users) and Optus (more than 7 million users).
In India, on the other hand, Vodafone has about 44 million customers, hence it's the country where the operator most probably has the highest profits.
Italy and Turkey are also among the markets where Vodafone has substantial subscriber bases and, together with the rest of the countries announced to "receive" the iPhone, they will bring the number of sold iPhones to much more than the current four and a half million mark.