Apple and AT&T together: A Problem for VoIP Service Providers perhaps?
Most of the people in US who bought iPhone with an AT&T contract are found complaining all the time about the network coverage and unavailibility of the service due to network load and congestions. The carrier that was overlooked once as to be the major future success in wireless telecom industry on the launch of iPhone, is now seems to be a burden for those who wish to buy the new Apple iPad. Apple revealed its iPad in the last week of January with the usual AT&T contract proposal.
Despite so many complaints filed by subscribers against the AT&T, it is quite surprising why Apple still wishes to coninue the partnership with AT&T in the US till the end of this year, and maybe it will extend to next year too.
As far as the other countries are concerned, during the Monday’s quarterly earnings conference call, Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook explained that Apple would inevitably adopt a multi-carrier strategy in all the countries where the company believes a multi-carrier system would happen anyhow. But, for US, everyone wonders why a single carrier strategy is embraced?
“We think iPhone customers are having a great experience from the research we’ve done,” Cook answered when was questioned with the very same.
On the other hand the situtaion is quite different to the satisfaction displayed by Cook. VoIP app developers and service providers are facing huge problems satisfying customers with AT&T plans. Subscribers say that even with a full signal bar and the 3G icon displayed on their iPhones, they are unable to connect via VoIP apps. Not to forget that very recently Apple lifted up the restriction of VoIP calls over 3G network, and most of the iPhone users have tried to use the VoIP apps to cut down the huge network call rates from their service providers.
Burdening a single carrier in a country with more than 7 million iPhone users might be good for the corporate culture, but maybe Apple needs to consider the problems VoIP developers and service providers are facing in comforting their valued app users. In short, users should have a freedom of choosing the carrier they are comfortable with.
