Jason Sinclair of the Dow Jones Newswires, reports that Telefonica SA (TEF) has received 300,000 pre registrations in the U.K. and Spain to buy the upcoming iPhone 3G.
A company spokesman claims that customers have been reserving units of the device on the company’s website since Telefonica announced it would sell the handset earlier this month. Telefonica will begin selling the 3G iPhone July 11 in Spain, the Czech Republic and twelve Latin American countries.
Analysts say the popular handset will help Telefonica boost cellular revenue as the company faces a potential slowdown in consumer spending in its home Spanish market. Telefonica is the largest telecommunications company in Spain and already sells the original version of the iPhone in the U.K. and Ireland. Yet Apple’s retail stores in the UK may be unable to sell the new device due to the new activation policy that requires customers to subscribe to a carrier in-store, as opposed to at their home through iTunes.
“A British customer previously revealed that O2 – potentially other carriers as well – will allegedly offer a pre-registration service for customers who want to buy on the 11th of July. A visit to an O2 store yielded information that the carrier will offer users an early-bird registration credit check on July 1st to expedite the pickup process on launch day.” via MacNN.
