Thursday, April 21, 2011

Dual Mode iPhone 5? Potentially Yes

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Just a couple of months out of the gate the CDMA based iPhone 4, is going to be supplanted by an iPhone 5 as early as September an early sign that there will be a single model iPhone 5 that supports both CDMA and HSPA networks comes from an announcement from the Chief Financial Officer, Fran Shammo of Verizon Communications that next iPhone will be a Global model that would support both CDMA for Verizon's network and GSM for roaming outside of North America. 

Would it make sense to make a iPhone CDMA/GSM hybrid for Verizon and a HSPA only version for AT&T?  Would it make more sense to make a single model that supports both CDMA and HSPA to sell to all carriers that sell iPhones?  It would be cheaper for Apple's manufacturing partners though. 

A hybrid CDMA/HSPA iPhone would be beneficial to Canadian subscribers on Telus and Bell that still have some parts of their networks in remote areas that have not been upgraded to HSPA that are still CDMA only.  For smaller Canadian carriers MTS, Sasktel and TbayTel that launching the iPhone on April 26th, they still have large portions of their networks that will be CDMA only for a year or two to come. 

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