AT&T Expects to Sell Pre After Sprint Exclusivity Ends

ImageSpeaking to The Wall Street Journal today during the D: All Things Digital conference, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson has stated that he expects the carrier to offer the highly anticipated Palm Pre after Sprint’s exclusivity period which is expected to end six months after launch.

This is despite previous reports that AT&T will be offering the Centro successor in the Palm Eos later this year, which bears many similarities to the Pre in design and functionality.

Humberto Saabedra is the Editor-in-Chief of AnimeNews.bizPhoneNews.com and an occasional columnist for Ani.me. He can also be found musing on things at @AnimeNewsdotbiz

10 responses to “AT&T Expects to Sell Pre After Sprint Exclusivity Ends”

  1. K4PL

    After reading this, I am done with A&T. Just like a Prima Donna for wanting the spotlight. It’s disgusting how attention oriented they want to be. You have the iPhone coming out next month and you say this? WOW!

    All I can say is Sprint here I come!

  2. Jeff

    Palm should get Verizon to carry the Pre, not AT&T. I do a lot of traveling and I almost always see someone on an airplane with a Verizon Blackberry Storm and if I am sitting next to them I always ask them, “how do you like that phone”? The most common response I get is something like, “its only ok”, “email capabilities are great but not so much on the internet browser”, “I do not like the touch screeen that much, its hard to use at times”. Verizon is now the big dog terms of the number of U.S. subscribers after they absorbed Alltel. So, Verizon should be their number one perference for the next U.S. carrier and Verizon could use another high end smartphone choice for their customers. I do not mean to completely down talk the Blackberry Storm, sometimes people say they really like it and I do not have one so I am just going by what the most common feedback people give me that have one.

  3. ncage

    K4PL who really cares as long as you have the phone you want on the network you want? A “smart” company is going to do what is best for them and their investors. If it makes them more money then why not do it? I wish verizon was like this instead of having crappy smart phones (blackberry storm) and dumbing down ever phone that gets put on their network. I definitely welcome this……i want to have the phone i want on the network i want and not having to go with a certain carrier just because they have the phone i want. Case in point, the android….if you want it you have to go with TMobile which i refuse to do.

  4. Ivan Y

    @ everyone: it’s pretty much been assumed that all the carriers who carry Centro and other Palm phones would carry Pre after the end of the exclusive deal with Sprint.

  5. CR

    If ATT is going to carry it then verizon isn’t to far behind either. Sprint better rethink their everything plan only for the pre. At this point att has gsm on their side and verizon has great coverage on their side. Sprint has what on their side? Bad Customer service thats right. The GSM Version should be cool, especially being able to talk and surf the internet at the same time.

  6. SaltyDawg

    Talking on the phone while surfing the net is probably especially important on a phone like the Pre. With that Web OS I think it’s pretty much on the internet for most basic functions that the PDA’s of today process locally.

  7. TimTim

    Why would anyone want Verizon to get it? Do you really want a crippled crap version of that phone? I can see it now…. no wifi and no streaming of any content. I don’t see how you verizon guys could be happy wit them always crippling your phones like they do.

  8. Don Louie
  9. SaltyDawg

    So the Pre is now a non story for Sprint. They’ll have it for 6 months, and then everyone else will get it too. great news for Palm. With them basically betting the fate of their company on the success of the Pre, Sprint having an exclusive was not a good thing for them. Now that we know their exclusive is not that long, and everyon eelse is already planning on carrying it, we may see a few more good devices from Palm in the coming months/years.

  10. JJ

    Its great news for Palm. Palm needs the pre to be on every network and with the eos coming out also palm might be back in the game. Its too bad for sprint, they needed this exclusivity agreement to be a lot longer to help them out. Lets hope sprint rolls out the 4g before anyone else and keep working on their customer service. I hope their 4g lets you talk and surf at the same time. This makes me want to switch to att.