The Carriers should just say NO! to Apple.

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by RainingLemur

I'd be ok with that.

I think you need to rethink that good buddy.

Apple usually charges a higher price than anyone else. The problems the carriers are having is that they are not passing that charge on to the customers. That is why they are showing reduced margins.

For example, I think the carriers are going to charge about $300 or more for a the non Apple product, the Samsung Galaxy Note.

If Apple owns the carrier and the phone, they will not absorb anything. In fact you will pay a premium both for the carrier and the phone.

[=X=]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Mobile phone charges tend to be lower in Europe than in the US because we have a much more competitive market.

Pay attention to that dude's sig, he's from Australia. $.90 a min is outrageously expensive here in the states. Today's market is more about what kind of service you want and not so much outright minutes.

Example $60 a month can you unlimited data, min & text.
Pay as you go can be a subscription, pay per day use $1 unlimited min, or minutes.

International calling, based on your plan can range from $.10-$.45. Except for T-mobile which charges $4 a min.

=X=

[Kumabjorn]

Actually, that wasn't HarryT, it was me.
Since poster didn't specify AU$ I assumed it was US$

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

I think you need to rethink that good buddy.

Apple usually charges a higher price than anyone else. The problems the carriers are having is that they are not passing that charge on to the customers. That is why they are showing reduced margins.

For example, I think the carriers are going to charge about $300 or more for a the non Apple product, the Samsung Galaxy Note.

If Apple owns the carrier and the phone, they will not absorb anything. In fact you will pay a premium both for the carrier and the phone.

I think that what you are not seeing is that non-IPhone carriers LOSE customers to carriers that have the iPhone.
Its better than to have a low margin customer than no customer.
Now to you, an iPhone is just like any other smartphone, but clearly the smartphone buying public doesn't see it that way, and the carriers are mindful of that, hence their willingness to pay more for the iPhone.

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by stonetools

I think that what you are not seeing is that non-IPhone carriers LOSE customers to carriers that have the iPhone.
Its better than to have a low margin customer than no customer.
Now to you, an iPhone is just like any other smartphone, but clearly the smartphone buying public doesn't see it that way, and the carriers are mindful of that, hence their willingness to pay more for the iPhone.

stonetools, I understand that. The carriers are gaining additional customers and losing money, and if they didn't have the iPhone would probably lose some the customers that they had already, though they might make more money overall.

The point of the article was that for the carriers the iPhone is a bittersweet drug. They can't do without it, but it hurts.
My joke was that they are trying to make up for the individual losses with volume.

The obvious answer in a logic driven world would be for the carriers to just charge as normal for the iPhone, and not defray so much of its cost.

But alas, alas, they are caught in the opium den stupor and are "chasing the dragon." i.e. the Apple customers.

I believe that this adds to the desire of the carriers to charge more for usage, to cap the amounts of data, and to drive the customers that have unlimited usage back to the caps by throttling them when they go over 2GB.

Yeah you have unlimited usage Mr big user, but at around 2.5 GB you will be at 28KiloBaud. ((See we are living up to our promise.))

[RainingLemur]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

I think you need to rethink that good buddy.

Apple usually charges a higher price than anyone else. The problems the carriers are having is that they are not passing that charge on to the customers. That is why they are showing reduced margins.

For example, I think the carriers are going to charge about $300 or more for a the non Apple product, the Samsung Galaxy Note.

If Apple owns the carrier and the phone, they will not absorb anything. In fact you will pay a premium both for the carrier and the phone.

Why? I don't use Apple stuff. I wouldn't mind being able to go into my carrier's location and not be force-fed iPhones and iPads by all the sales guys. They're more pushy about those than the dudes at actual Apple stores, in my experience. If Apple had their own iWireless, I couldn't care less about what they charge as it wouldn't directly apply to me. I understand that the existing carriers could/would take a significant hit and I'm being incredibly short-sighted about my half-arsed desire, but I'm just sharing a pipe-dream. Nothing more.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by =X=

Pay attention to that dude's sig, he's from Australia. $.90 a min is outrageously expensive here in the states. Today's market is more about what kind of service you want and not so much outright minutes.

Example $60 a month can you unlimited data, min & text.
Pay as you go can be a subscription, pay per day use $1 unlimited min, or minutes.

International calling, based on your plan can range from $.10-$.45. Except for T-mobile which charges $4 a min.

=X=

It's outrageously expensive for Australia, too. When I was working there recently, I bought a SIM for my iPhone from an Australian company called "Amaysim". A$39.90/month for unlimited voice calls and text, plus 4GB data, on a rolling monthly contract.

[wannabee]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's outrageously expensive for Australia, too. When I was working there recently, I bought a SIM for my iPhone from an Australian company called "Amaysim". A$39.90/month for unlimited voice calls and text, plus 4GB data, on a rolling monthly contract.

that's good.but I didn't have a phone and the politics with carriers also isn;t worth the trouble of using unknown carriers.

[azazel1024]

Yes, sort of. The difference is, as an extreme example, that instead of spending 25 billion and earning 25 billion and $2 back, they are earning 50 billion and $3 back. Lower margins, but more profit.

Yes their voice and data costs are something, but they are actually relatively low. The major costs are building out the infrastructure to handle increased bandwidth and new technology in markets where it didn't exist before. That certainly costs something, but they also reap the rewards down the line.

A bank makes no money off giving me a loan right away. Heck it costs them every cent of that loan out of their pockets. However, down the line they make plenty of money on that loan to me in interest, so long as I don't default.

Same thing with ANY company that is "utility" related in particular and most other companies for that matter. All companies have some kind of capitol costs, and they generally have to sink that capitol before they can start producing and/or selling goods or services. Those are upfront costs (unless they are borrowing the money) that MUST be paid, but ideally they get return on their investment overtime.

A utility company, like a wireless carrier, has some huge capitol costs in investing in infrastructure, but their ongoing costs are actually relatively small. They are still billions of dollars, but simply maintaining existing infrastructure is a pretty small piece of their financial puzzel.

If Verizon completely stopped building out their 3G and 4G networks and halted all capitol expenditures and focused only on keeping their existing infrastructure operating and shut down all brick and mortar stores...well per subscriber costs probably wouldn't be more than $5-10 a month to the company. They'd fold in relatively short order, but their actual costs to carry data (basically electricity and maintenance) are low.

Cellular data costs more, because the infrastructure IS more expensive to maintain. But if you ignore building out more capacity (which is required to keep customers happy, support additional customers and support higher device data consumption), the existing costs are low.

For traditional "all over the wire" data costs are something on the order of 1-2 cents per Gigabyte of data to traditional carriers. Costs to cellular carriers depend on if the data is 3G or 4G, but ignore build outs, the actual costs in maintenance of the existing network and electrical means that per Gigabyte cost is still obscenely low, on the order of 3-6 cents per GB of data on 4G LTE.

Of course factoring in what it cost to build the network, loan payments (assuming the company borrowed money for the capitol investment) and adding capacity increases the cost significantly, but the actual costs to the company for you transmitting the data and continuing to allow the data to be transmitted is pretty low.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by RainingLemur

I'd be ok with that.

Originally Posted by SeaKing

If Apple owns the carrier and the phone, they will not absorb anything. In fact you will pay a premium both for the carrier and the phone.

That's why I'm with RainingLemur: I'd be ok with that. Let them try to set up their own carrier service. Let's see how much profit that will suck up... Or how much customers they'd lose (which will also reduce profit).

[heySkippy]

I really doubt federal regulators would allow Apple to enter the carrier business.

[Penforhire]

Why not? They are against monopolies and got between AT&T and T-Mobile. Apple, as a carrier, would provide another choice. A good thing for consumers.

I doubt it will happen but only because Apple is very careful with its cash and as Azazel noted there are massive infrastructure costs to roll out a new network. Little fish, like Republic Wireless, piggyback onto existing infrastructure (they lease Sprint's). A new big player would not be competitive that way.

[azazel1024]

Of course considering Apple's cash reserves, there is nothing stopping them from buying one of the larger carriers, such as T-Mobile to get in on the game.

[murraypaul]

Why would it be a game they want to play?
At the moment they can play each of the carriers off against the others to get good prices. They are sucking profits away from the carriers and to themselves.
If they get into the carrier business they are in direct competition. Why?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by rhadin

I've been with AT&T for about 8 years now; 7 of them without contract. We have so many rollover minutes that I never pay more than monthly minimum. But what bothers AT&T is that I have no data plans, and am not interested in one. Every couple of months they offer me a good upgrade deal, which I turn down because it would require a contract. Lately, the offers have been for a couple of free iPhones.

Hey! They don't bug me at all.
(Should I feel slighted?)
My smartphone's a four year old Cingular 3125 (AKA HTC STAR TREK) and I use it for... phone calls. With the 5000+ rollover minutes, no data service use, and no texting (that's what email's for) I just pay minimum. Maybe they forgot about me?

http://www.google.com/imgres?q=cingu...Gl6n8Dg&zoom=1

I've never felt the need to consolidate all my digital functions into one over-priced compromise box. I suppose I'll upgrade someday... when old faithful dies. But even the factory battery is still holding a multi-day charge; haven't had to pop in the spare. HTC builds good phones, I guess.