This past Saturday, one ambitious iPhone 3G owner and AAPL investor, known as, “BillH,” made a contribution to The Mac Observer’s Apple Finance Board (AFB) reporting his recently purchased device’s International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number.
So what is the importance of all this you may ask. The number that he had reported may represent a significant benchmark for Apple Inc. and may show signs of iPhone sales running far ahead of previous predictions. A joint project between AFB and Investor Village’s AAPL Sanity has been cataloging IMEI numbers and allocating them within a Google spreadsheet. By tracking these number, they have been able to determine with a fair amount of accuracy that Apple has built at least 5,649,000 iPhone 3Gs.
When added to the 2.4 million first generation iPhones that Apple had reported to be sold in the first half of 2008, this would mean that Apple has manufactured over 8 million iPhones this year.
Additionally, with, Foxconn, the Taiwanese electronics company that manufactures the iPhone 3G for Apple producing around 800,000 units per week, it appears as though Apple will make, if not sell their 10 millionth iPhone 3G by the end of September. Apple has time and again expressed their hopes to sell 10 million iPhones in 2008 and with this recent news they may meet their mark with time to spare.
[via Fortune]
