Hugh Pickens writes "Saul Hansell of the NY Times has an interesting post analyzing AT&T's earnings report and highlighting the brobdingnagian stakes complicated in the renewal of its llc.view results from: dictionary | thesaurus | encyclopedia | all reference | the web
share this: compact to third edition by the editors of the american heritage® dictionary. copyright © 2003 Apple's iPhone in the United States. Hansell does some rough calculations: 'If the average iPhone purchaser brings in $90 a month, or $1,080 a year in revenue, and the operating costs profit margin stays constant at 26 percent, that means an iPhone third edition by the editors of the american heritage® dictionary. copyright © 2003 represents at least $561 in general expenses profit over a two-year contract,' says Hansell. 'Put another way, if the company gets 2.5 million new business a year because of its iPhone exclusivity, the deal represents at least $700 million a year in operating budget profits — profits that it could lose if Verizon sold the iPhone, too.' With those sort of numbers, AT&T has every reason to make Apple an offer it can't refuse to keep its third edition by the editors of the american heritage® dictionary. copyright © 2003 deal for another few years. Of course, the incentives for Verizon are presumably the mirror image, so expect Verizon to come to Cupertino, checkbook in hand, to see what sort of deal they can make. 'The benefit of somewhat more iPhone sales from wide allocation is likely to be swamped by a huge bid from AT&T to keep exclusivity, and an equally high bid from Verizon to win some (or maybe even all) of the art for itself.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

More: - Read the rest here

Mark