Reports from within the Apple community in Germany have Vodafone preparing itself to start selling the iPhone 4 across the country from 28th October. This move looks set to frustrate T-Mobile who currently enjoys exclusivity for the iPhone 4 in Germany.
In an attempt to disrupt Vodafone's marketing campaign, T-Mobile is already offering discounted pricing with customers able to get a 10 per cent discount on monthly T-Mobile rates for the first year of a two year contract.
The Vodafone ad campaign, scheduled to start 18th October, will not highlight that the iPhone 4 will be locked to its network, whereas O2 Germany--which is also rumoured to be hatching its own iPhone 4 launch, will not lock the Apple handset.
Apple and European operators have faced opposition to exclusive contacts since the launch of the first iPhones. In 2007, a German court ordered Deutsche Telekom to sell the iPhone unlocked and without a contract after Vodafone filed a complaint, while a year later a French court ruled that an exclusive deal between Apple and France Telecom's Orange was in violation of competition and pricing laws.
Following the French ruling, the iPhone's market share in France jumped to above 40 per cent.
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