phandroid

Many people on all sides of this equation aren’t happy. HTC EVO 4G owners can’t get replacement phones if Sprint can’t keep them in stock. Would-be EVO owners remain on the sidelines waiting for supply to come to terms with demand. HTC’s missing out on shipping one of the hottest devices in America, and Sprint [...]

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Bitbang3r

I'll bet Sprint is really wishing they had just a bit more device (and supplier) diversity for their phone ecosystem right about now... like a DroidX-like phone from Motorola locked in a deathrace with Samsung to see who can get it into Sprint's stores first and take advantage of the Evo's relative rarity.

Frankly, I suspect the Evo shortage itself is partly due to Sprint's uncertainty about how the Epic4g's release is going to affect Evo demand. The last thing they want to do is pull out all the stops to order another million Evos only to have demand for them tank the day the Epic4g arrives.

Unfortunately, it's what happens when half of a duopoly of duopolies (Sprint+Verizon, AT&T+T-Mobile) treats its own product lines like a pre-rationed duopoly between exactly two phones from exactly two suppliers, with exclusivity agreements and noncompete dates thrown into the mix to screw everything up even more. Right now, Sprint probably has a warehouse full of Epic4g phones they aren't allowed to even admit exists until 45 or 60 days after June 4. It's sad, but I can almost guarantee that Evo shortage or not, the first Epic4g will magically and without advance warning go from "nonexistent" to "available as of 9am this morning at Sprint stores across America" exactly 42, 45, 56, or 60 days to the dot after June 4th.

Last edited by Bitbang3r; July 12th, 2010 at 08:28 PM.

ari-free

My concern is that sprint isn't able to do a good rapid response to Apple's facetime campaign. Sprint could be saying "we have videochat too but for 3G as well as wifi" and Apple would be left with the magical antenna as the only unique feature of the iPhone4.
It's not so hard to understand: people want to see their grandkids being born or their girlfriends during a work break and Sprint had the foresight to have this feature (sorry Verizon and teen-mobile) but they must be prepared for aggressive campaigning.