Rumors are buzzing about Apple’s release of new 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) enabled devices next year in Japan. These will be released in partnership with Japan’s biggest carrier by number of subscribers, NTT DoCoMo. As per Nikkei Business report, iPad 3 and iPhone 5 are scheduled for next year release. iPad 3 will be the first to come out in summer and then followed by iPhone in the fall. Our previous post talked about the clash between these devices for a release date, but it seems the iPad may have won.
2012 fall release of iPhone 5 means about a year gap with the iPhone 4S release. This gap is in accordance with the time frame followed by Apple in its previous releases. DoCoMo is expected to roll out its LTE infrastructure across Japan in the coming months. Though DoCoMo is Japan’s biggest telco, they are unable to add iPhone to their network as they want to pre-install their own popular applications on the device. Also the carrier is concerned over Apple’s unit volume commitment demands. Softbank and KDDI operators have agreement with iPhone and it is proving to be a huge success.
NTT DoCoMo dominates the LTE market and they recently released LTE-enabled Samsung’s Galaxy S II. It is rumored that Apple’s CEO Tim Cook met the NTT DoCoMo’s team last month and they reached to some kind of an agreement. Apple cannot ignore DoCoMo, considering their staggering subscribers and the domination in LTE market.
