Orange and Apple told to end exclusive agreement in France
Apple must end its exclusive agreement with Orange and allow other mobile providers to sell the iPhone in France according to a decision handed down today by France’s Competition Council. This temporary injunction was announced as part of an ongoing investigation into a complaint filed by Orange rival, Bouygues Telecom SA. In the complaint, Bouygues Telecom claims Apple’s exclusive deal with Orange is a serious threat to competition amongst mobile operators and is costly to consumers who are forced to switch providers in order to purchase an iPhone. The Competition Council, in its initial ruling agrees in part with Bouygues complaint, and states that the exclusive agreement between Orange and Apple “by nature introduces a new factor of rigidity in a sector that already lacks competition”. This temporary injunction will remain in effect until a final decision is made by the Competition Council. As expected, Bouygues Telecom is pleased with decision and is looking forward to selling the iPhone in the near future while representatives at Orange have not been available for comment.
get ‘em
who gives a rats ass.. lets see iphone 3 already
@mangenius You are joking right? What else can apple do. They are not going to release a new iphone every year. At best they may release a dumbed down version of the iphone and call it the iphone nano or something. The only reason they released the iphone 3G so quickly was because they realized that they put outdated technology on the market(edge only) and they wanted to be able to say that they had the best phone. The Iphone is currently one of the best phones so they will not release another one until someone else makes a phone that truly beats the current iphone.
the french show us how to do this son!! props to them cause that deal with a single carrier is like dictatorship
SMH….The Competition Council??? Is that like the Hip Hop Police? *coughs* Bullshit!!
Excuse me Balla, but a dictatorship is the government telling people & businesses what to do.
How you say… Frances le’ sux?
Wow, a country that actually forces the hand of El Jobo. There should be no exclusive deals, I understand its about upfront money from carriers, but allowing all carriers to carry any phone is better for… THE CONSUMER!!!!!!!
Its called capitalism its what made this country great move to france if you like socialism
Wow, this is a victory… Now if only the US tried regulating the crimes that American wireless providers commit on their customers, we’d be getting somewhere.
I really don’t understand how the iPhone exclusivity deals are different than any other exclusivity deals. T-Mobile USA has the Sidekick, Verizon has the BlackBerry Storm, etc. If there’s a phone you must have that is exclusive to one carrier, than either you A) go with that carrier or B) go without that phone. I don’t see why a government should step in to prevent those sorts of deals. It’s really no different than a game being exclusive to a specific console, or a product being exclusive to a specific retailer, IMO.
You could argue that all of those things are “unfriendly” to “THE CONSUMER!!!!!”, and I guess that’s sort of true…but in the same way that, y’know, “running a business” and “charging for your services” is unfriendly to customers. I’m normally an advocate for consumers but I really don’t see the big deal here. It’s no different from any other form of competition – if you want something that’s exclusive to one business, you have to go there.
I mean, where does it end? Should Toys R Us not be allowed to carry exclusive toys? Should Nintendo be forced to also make games for the PlayStation? I honestly don’t see the difference between that and forcing a company to make a phone available for all carriers.
@mog
The iphone is different. Not too many people are switching carriers to get the new sidekick. It really isn’t fair for apple to only sell to one carrier.
In TRUE FREE capitalist country, a business succeeds or fails because they make good or bad decisions. Not because the goverment tells the business how to run their business. Goverment knows politics but had no idea how to run a business.
The CONSUMER reaction will prove if the deal was good or bad. If EVERY CONSUMER just takes his money somewhere else the Business will change or the competition will kill them.
In this case if people don’t like what Apple is doing. Just don’t buy the damm phone.
I, personally, since 1979 I haven’t give a cent to Apple. Others had bought their products it’s also their right and Freedom. But still I believe Apple has the right and the FREEDOM to run their business model.
Wow. It’s sad to see so many people here cheering this on. Nobody is forcing anyone to buy an iPhone. Period. It’s a shiny toy you want to play with and show off to your friends. That’s it. It’s not something society or the economy relies on so no government should have a say in how it’s marketed. “The iPhone is different!” No it’s not. The only difference is that you want one really, really bad. It’s fair for Apple to do what they want with their phone after investing so much brain power, risk and treasure to make it. I seriously doubt if the government would be stepping in to help Apple if these exclusive deals ended up being losers for Apple.
What’s sad is that the French government (and apparently the kids here) don’t have a grasp of what competition really is. You see, if the iPhone is available to every carrier, then other companies like LG, RIM, Nokia, Motorola, HTC, Sony, etc. wouldn’t be pressured to come up with their own “iPhone-killer” (and exclusive deals). The iPhone is simply too popular. But now that some carriers are left out of the iPhone action, they can make deals with manufacturers to produce something new (and market it heavily). So, in the last two years, we have a ton of cool phones available to us and we have carriers offering all sorts of goodies to get you away from that iPhone you want. And THAT’s because of competition.
Here in the US, AT&T spent a HUGE amount of money to promote the iPhone and continues to do so. And, reports are that they aren’t making a ton of cash because of how much they have to pay Apple for each phone subsidy. The exclusive deal with Apple is the only reason that AT&T is willing to make the iPhone so affordable for consumers and so promoted for Apple. If the government came along and told Apple to sell to any carrier in the US, AT&T would have taken that risk and cost for nothing. THAT’d be unfair.
Yeah, because Capitalism seems to doing just great, its not like the USA is on the verge of Bankruptcy and our entire financial system turned out to be bogus and full of crooks. Yeah, that could NEVER happen @mog in the good ol commie’ fee USA.
I just wish people over the age of 30 read this blog and commeneted once in a while, its a sad day to see the state of Americas youth in the condition it is in. Like I would trust you asswads with ANYTHING with your ignorance, hate and me-to society bullshit.
What Apple and AT&T is doing is in fact illegal in the US, There ARE laws on the books requiring ANY handset to be purchased and used on ANY network if paid at full price. No ones even brought this little morsel up to De la Vega or the asswads at ATT.
What’s up with all the old people hatin’ on the young people? Sorry you’re wrinkled and not youthful anymore. Get over it. Our ages have nothing to do with our opinions.
@tony
It does when you know dick. Which is what most young people these days know. Absolutely nothing. You’re totally showing off that shiny, new maturity with statements such as, “sry ur old and reenkled LMAO I’m yung and kewl LOL.”
Ugh, wake me up in 2 or 3 more generations. And this is coming from a 22 year old.
In case you haven’t noticed France is a country. They have different laws. Just because someone agrees with them doesn’t mean that they’re stupid or “don’t know dick”.
I remember a time when wireless carriers had exclusive rights over phone numbers. Did people still say yay! for capitalism? Then government stepped in to restore competition.
This hardware exclusivity is only the latest ploy by carriers to lock in customers. If a device can (as-is) technically work with another carrier and the carrier meets the manufacturer’s financial requirements then there is no business case not to sell to the other carrier. These agreements only serve to destabilize the industry.
The original Iphone could technically run on both AT&T and TMO and that is where the exclusivity agreement made a difference. If both TMO and AT&T sold the Iphone, I wonder where both companies would stand today?
The Iphone 3G is different as it cannot work as intented on TMO without redesigning the hardware and exclusivity is moot.
Man I’m 19 and hate other people my own age due to the lack of self-control and poor judgements they make. I’m running a Curves for women, going to college, and assisting in managing a chain store. The iphone is a nice toy and even has gotten me to sign the line for it on both launch days. I find it complete bullshit that even when you pay in full for the phone ATT and apple refuse to unlock the phone. True they deserve to make money off those who sign up for it but when its paid in full, then they should fuck off. Makes me glad to know that I buy my phones unlocked and from overseas since the iphone is the razrs new bff. I see more iphones in a day than I see decent phones
This is why government should not get involved in business. If I decided to make and sell my own cell phone I can make it run on which ever network I want. If a company (AT&T) Wanted to buy my phones for full price and sell them for half that, with a contract, then the government has no stance to tell me i have to modify my device (unlock codes) so it can run on someone elses network who did not make the investment into my product. Why doesn’t the government go in and tell them they have to make it CDMA too, so its fair for every carrier to use it. The iPhone is not a public utility, it is not a necessity, its something a consumer wants to buy, and if apple wants to only sell it to work on a specific carrier, then its their perogative (sp?). If you want said product, sign a contract, if not then buy one on ebay and unlock it using sim unlock or wait for dev team to launch its unlock. At that point you own the product and do what you want with it.
good every carrier should carry every phone. they are right. no wonder France is one of the best countries to live in no matter what they tel us here. Its BS they dont want us to like the French because our government doesnt want us to live like them.
Those guys always get what they want, because they protest and strike and the government is afraid of people and not the other way around like here.
“What Apple and AT&T is doing is in fact illegal in the US”
And again, how is that any different from any other carrier with their elusive phones? In Europe, most of it, you can buy any phone on any network, and people don’t know what a contract is, but everybody always pay a full price for the phone, that is why iPhone is around $1000 in Poland, Russia, India… wherever else they sell it. Is that what you guys want for US, people are complaining about a $200 price already, but really don’t even realize how awesome we have it here already.
“Yeah, because Capitalism seems to doing just great, its not like the USA is on the verge of Bankruptcy and our entire financial system turned out to be bogus and full of crooks. Yeah, that could NEVER happen @mog in the good ol commie’ fee USA. ”
You have no clue, do you? How well are the communist countries doing? How well are the pseudo-socialist European countries doing? Every economy in the world is in a lot of pain right now. I remember reading about people like you when I was in school. You’re one of those people who used to talk about how great the Soviet economy was and how it could teach us a lot of lessons because the American economy was collapsing in the 70’s and early 80’s, right? It doesn’t matter if you’re young or old, ignorant is still ignorant.
Aaaah Europe, you gotta love it here!
Regulations are to benefit us consumers. With no regulations big companies like Apple would rip us off even more.
Guys over there in the US are blasted so much misinformation about the “free market based economy” that you actually belive all that bs blindly.
If you just look at what mess it brought you would think the people in the US would stop and think for a minute, that something is wrong….
I recommend the documentary Zeitgeist to all of you. Open your eyes people!