I'm still bullish on Apple's iPhone
AT&T announced Tuesday that 146,000 iPhone subscribers signed up for its service in t he first two days of its launch. Good news for AT&T, given that 40% of the subscribers were new subscribers for the phone giant. But the news was largely disappointing due to expectations. AT&T shares were down nearly 1% and Apple's shares fell nearly 3% on the news. The concern is that the iPhone is getting the same attention as the hype led investors to believe. Goldman Sachs had projected 700,000 phones would be sold over the first three days.
I don't know if that number will be hit, but I'm sure the number of phone sold are higher than the number activated. This is partly because people are inherently lazy and/or extremely busy. I have an iPhone sitting in my home office and I've yet to activate it. One reason is that my four-year-old Apple PowerBook G4 doesn't work with the Apple iPhone. And, one way to activate the iPhone is to go through iTunes. I'm sure I can get this activated pretty easily by going to the Apple store or to an AT&T store. But it's just too time consuming for me right now. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's time constrained.
I still believe that Apple's iPhone is revolutionary and is making the world recognize the possibilities of what can be delivered on a tiny device.
I'll stick with my prediction that Apple's iPhone will be well received. But now that I have a nearly $650 phone that's not activated, I'd bet that it will take Apple's next-generation, lower-priced iPhone to drive units sold to over 1 million.
Bambi Francisco Roizen
Founder and CEO of Vator, a media and research firm for entrepreneurs and investors; Managing Director of Vator Health Fund; Co-Founder of Invent Health; Author and award-winning journalist.
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