This shows you how much money there is to be made - Debitel can afford to give a customer a 600 Euro (that’s almost $1000) sign-up bonus if they have bought an unlocked iPhone from t-mobile in Germany for 999 Euros:

Debitel launches German iPhone plan, offers 600 eur sign-up bonus
27/11/2007 15:03 London Time | story 0997

FRANKFURT (Thomson Financial) - German mobile phone service provider Debitel AG said it is launching a phone plan for Apple Inc’‘s iPhone, taking advantage of a recent German court ruling that forced Deutsche Telekom AG to change the way it sells the handheld device.
The company is offering customers from tomorrow a 600 eur sign-up bonus to compensate for the added cost of buying the phone without a T-Mobile contract.
Deutsche Telekom, whose T-Mobile wireless unit acquired exclusive German distribution rights for Apple’‘s iPhone earlier this year and started selling the handheld with a technical blockage restricting its use to the T-Mobile network and with an obligatory two-year wireless contract.
The company last week said it will start selling the iPhone for 999 eur without the blockage, which is 600 eur more than the company charges for the iPhone in combination with a two-year T-Mobile contract.
Deutsche Telekom was complying with a court order after Vodafone won an injunction, claiming that T-Mobile’‘s terms of sales unfairly discourage its own customers from using the gadget.

This is simply fantastic! It means an iPhone buyer pays 999 Euros for their iPhone , which probably means Apple and T-Mobile split the “spare” 600 Euros between them 50/50 and Apple walk away with an immediate payment of 300 Euros on top of the 400 they get for the iPhone itself.

That’s 2 years’ of subscriber revenue sharing in one go! And the customer gets the iPhone on a non T-Mobile network (for whatever reason they might want to) for the same price after they receive the sign-up bonus.

If this idea catches on with the mainstream telcos (and lets remember the same thing could happen in France where the iPhone is also available unlocked) we could see iPhone sales rocket way beyond expectations in Europe!

Holly Crap.

this is huge.

Apple understands it, Vodafone gets it, the rest of the carries sees the threat, AFB has known it for a year, but the only fools who don’t see it is WS

Re: German telco offers 600 Euro bonus for unlocked iphones

[quote author=“Tommo_UK”]This shows you how much money there is to be made - Debitel can afford to give a customer a 600 Euro (that’s almost $1000) sign-up bonus if they have bought an unlocked iPhone from t-mobile in Germany for 999 Euros:

Debitel launches German iPhone plan, offers 600 eur sign-up bonus
27/11/2007 15:03 London Time | story 0997

FRANKFURT (Thomson Financial) - German mobile phone service provider Debitel AG said it is launching a phone plan for Apple Inc’‘s iPhone, taking advantage of a recent German court ruling that forced Deutsche Telekom AG to change the way it sells the handheld device.
The company is offering customers from tomorrow a 600 eur sign-up bonus to compensate for the added cost of buying the phone without a T-Mobile contract.
Deutsche Telekom, whose T-Mobile wireless unit acquired exclusive German distribution rights for Apple’‘s iPhone earlier this year and started selling the handheld with a technical blockage restricting its use to the T-Mobile network and with an obligatory two-year wireless contract.
The company last week said it will start selling the iPhone for 999 eur without the blockage, which is 600 eur more than the company charges for the iPhone in combination with a two-year T-Mobile contract.
Deutsche Telekom was complying with a court order after Vodafone won an injunction, claiming that T-Mobile’‘s terms of sales unfairly discourage its own customers from using the gadget.

I wonder if it is a 600 Ђ credit or cash back?

Re: German telco offers 600 Euro bonus for unlocked iphones

[quote author=“SNIPUS”]
I wonder if it is a 600 Ђ credit or cash back?

Anyway : this is a LOT! @ Ђ 50 / month = one year free calling.

I guess you will have to sigh a 24year contract the least then. They gain half of the others, yet the half is better then nothing.

[quote author=“artman1033”]I just don’t get it.  I consider Leopard to be just a little bit better than Tiger. For the same reason I consider the iphone to be just a little bit better than the ipod touch. The consumer who pays 600 EUROs extra will have a very expensive device he can drop and break. He will have a very expensive device he can lose. It is a very expensive first generation device that he will want to upgrade in two years. I see the consumer switching to t-mobile.

Yes, but this way the consumer gets to buy an unlocked iPhone legitimately from T-Mobile, and gets the 600 Euro penalty refunded by Debitel. You may wonder why bother, considering that Visual Voicemail wont work, and suchlike, and I would agree it seems pointless, especially considering the free WiFi provided by T-Mobile, and the all-you-can-eat data plan.

The answer is that it is unlocked which means the owner, who might travel frequently, can now put in an SIM card from anywhere in the world and have it work.

If Vodafone (who have denied they have any plans to offer an iPhone tariff for unlocked phone) or any of the other networks in Germany offered something similar, they could offer a special iPhone plan including free WiFi too.

This is a win/win for Apple, T-Mobile, and the consumer. Whatever happens, everyone wins. Especially shareholders

This may prove good news for the consumer as well, since the networks will have to compete on service and rate plans.

[quote author=“willrob”]This may prove good news for the consumer as well, since the networks will have to compete on service and rate plans.

BIngo

The bigger story here is that other carriers are quickly learning from the US market that this product is a market changer.

They want it so badly because customers want it badly.

I drool thinking 3 years from now when the iPhones are less expensive and more main stream. 60 million sold by end of 09

Apple just re invented itself with this product and it evidenced by stories like this.

If any German-speakers come across more details on this deal, please post them. As SNIPUS wonders, I too am curious as to whether this is paid as a cash back or a credit to a new contract.

WRT to how the extra revenue might be booked, I posted this over on the IV board just now:

Ignoring sales margins, lets say Apple sell each iPhone to T-Mobile for 399 Euros. This revenue is amortised over 24 months.

For an unlocked phone, we know T-Mobile are going to charge an extra 600 Euros. To unlock an iPhone, T-Mobile have to submit the IMEI number to Apple, who then independently transmit a code to the iPhone in question roughly 24 hours later which unlocks it.

To keep the accounting simple, I am suggesting the way they Apple and T-Mobile will deal with this is for T-Mobile to be billed for each unlock request they make, revenue for which will be booked by Apple immediately as it is a service fee charged to T-Mobile and not part of the cost of the handset.

Pure speculation on my part, but I think its a strong possibility.

[quote author=“Tommo_UK”]If any German-speakers come across more details on this deal, please post them. As SNIPUS wonders, I too am curious as to whether this is paid as a cash back or a credit to a new contract.

not exactly concerning this deal but, t-mobile will run the show in austria (in german):

http://futurezone.orf.at/produkte/stories/238453/

expected early 2008.

[quote author=“Tommo_UK”]If any German-speakers come across more details on this deal, please post them. As SNIPUS wonders, I too am curious as to whether this is paid as a cash back or a credit to a new contract.

“Im Laufe der Woche will Debitel spezielle Mobilfunktarife fÑŒr das iPhone anbieten. Kдufer eines iPhones ohne SIM-Lock erhalten bei Vertragsabschluss 600,- Euro gutgeschrieben. Mit den speziellen Debitel-Tarifen kцnnen iPhone-Besitzer ÑŒber die Netze von Vodafone, E-Plus oder O2 zu дhnlichen Konditionen telefonieren, wie es bei T-Mobile der Fall ist.”

Translation:
During this week Debitel will introduce special tarifs the the iPhone. Buyers of an unlocked iPhone will receive 600 euros on signing a contract with debitel. With the Debitel offers, iPhone owners will be able to use the networks of vodafone, E-Plus or O2 to similar conditions as with T-mobile.

sounds good

http://www.golem.de/0711/56219.html

edit:
“Bis auf die Visual Voicemail sollen sich alle iPhone-Funktionen mit den angebotenen Debitel-Tarifen nutzen lassen.”
Tranlation:
with the exception of visual voicemail all iPhone features will function normally

[quote author=“the-irish-guy”]
Translation:
During this week Debitel will introduce special tarifs the the iPhone. Buyers of an unlocked iPhone
will receive 600 euros on signing a contract with debitel. With the Debitel offers, iPhone owners will be able to use the networks of vodafone, E-Plus or O2 to similar conditions as with T-mobile.

sounds good

http://www.golem.de/0711/56219.html

Sounds great...

So it sounds like a cash payment, but we’re note sure yet. I hope it is!

One of the cool features of the iphone is the intelligent way you can access voice messages; does anyone know if this is network specific or does it work even for a cracked/unlocked iPhone on another network?

[quote author=“Tommo_UK”]So it sounds like a cash payment, but we’re note sure yet. I hope it is!

No, i would say it seems more like a 600 euro credit onto your debitel telephone account

sounds good anyway.
as you said tommo, it shows the massive amount of money that is to be made from this, if debitel are prepared to do this