Verizon is circulating invitations to a Jan. 11 event in New
York City, sparking rampant speculation that the
carrier intends to announce that it will carry Apple’s iPhone.
According
to the bright red invite, the event will take place at 11 a.m. EST at Frederick P. Rose Hall at Lincoln
Center, with Verizon President and COO
Lowell McAdam serving as host. Aside from that, precious little information is offered.
That
hasn’t stopped the rumor mill from kicking into high gear. Reports have
circulated for months that Apple intends to release the iPhone on Verizon in
early 2011. An October article in The
Wall Street Journal, quoting people "briefed by Apple,"
suggested that Apple had slated a late-2010 production start for iPhones
capable of running on Verizon’s CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) network.
That came after sources told the blog TechCrunch in August that Apple had
ordered millions of Qualcomm CDMA chipsets for the upcoming smartphone.
Other
publications carried the story, including Fortune and The New York
Times. In each case, unnamed sources were cited for the information.
In
the past week, the drum roll for the Verizon iPhone’s appearance has only
accelerated. "Apple’s introduction of an iPhone for use on Verizon’s
network will come sometime after the Consumer Electronics Show in Las
Vegas in early January," read
a Dec. 29 report by Bloomberg Businessweek, citing "a person
familiar with Apple’s plans who is not authorized to discuss them publicly."
That article also suggested the unveiling event would be appropriately "splashy."
For more, read the eWeek article Verizon iPhone Could Be Unveiled Jan. 11.