IPhone hits France, AT&T promises 3G version in 2008

The French finally got their chance to embrace another American export last night. Move over McDonalds and EuroDisney.
Orange, the iPhone’s exclusive French carrier (owned by France Telecom), offered a typically complex French equation for those who wanted the device: the device costs $589 with one of four plans, ranging from $72 to $176 per month, according to Orange’s Web site.
Without one of those four plans, but presumably with an Orange contract, the device is priced at $811. With no plan, the device price is $959. And if you, like many French, demand freedom, equality, brotherhood or death!, Orange will unlock your iPhone for another $148. (French law requires Orange to provide the unlocking option.)
According to media reports, lines did form at some of the 12 Orange stores that began selling the device last night at 6:30 p.m., local time.
Didier Lombard, France Telecom’s top executive, has said the carrier aims to sell 100,000 iPhones by year’s end, 33 days from now, or a little more than 3,000 per day through December. Market analysis firm Ovum said that, with 14 million postpaid subscribers nationwide in France that the goal was “realistic.” M:Metrics reported this week that December continues to be the highest-performing month for new handset sales in Europe, with 15% of all subscribers purchasing a new handset in the final month of the year in 2006.
Orange reported that, prior to its sale, 63,000 people had registered their interest in more information in the device on the carrier’s Web site.
The iPhone is already on sale in the United Kingdom and Germany.
Apparently, those who demand freedom, equality, brotherhood or death! (the slogan of the French Revolution) may well receive the latter-those who open the iPhone and place a SIM card from another carrier have been warned that some features will not function and software updates may turn the device into a brick, which could be handy for the civil unrest that has wracked France for weeks.
3G iPhone
Back in the United States, AT&T Inc. CEO Randall Stephenson said that a 3G iPhone would arrive in 2008, according to a report from Bloomberg. When asked about the price, responded that Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs would “dictate” the price.