Despite Crippled Systems, Apple Blows Through iPhone Inventory
byMichael Baumert on June 16, 2010 4:42 PM
If you wanted an iPhone 4 and had the right mix of luck and patience yesterday, consider yourself one of the chosen few. Apple and AT&T could barely keep their sites functioning yesterday and yet managed to set a new record. 600,000 phones. Pre-sold.
"Yesterday Apple and its carrier partners took pre-orders for more than 600,000 of Apple's new iPhone 4. It was the largest number of pre-orders Apple has ever taken in a single day and was far higher than we anticipated, resulting in many order and approval system malfunctions. Many customers were turned away or abandoned the process in frustration. We apologize to everyone who encountered difficulties, and hope that they will try again or visit an Apple or carrier store once the iPhone 4 is in stock." (Apple PR)
And the pre-orders keep coming.. Apple's store won't be shipping out new iPhone 4s until mid-July. AT&T has suspended pre-ordering along with Best Buy and Radio Shack.
Seeing as how the best way to secure an iPhone seemed to be to reserve one at an Apple store, it's going to be pretty interesting to see what next Thursday's launch looks like - I'm guessing there will be a ton of lines to be seen.