From our paidContent:UK site: Prior to its launch at 6.02pm on Friday, Carphone Warehouse had forecast 10,000 iPhone sales on its first day. But in Germany, where the handset was available from 12.01am, T-Mobile was first to release its first-day sales stats, reaching the same 10,000 target and assuring in a statement: “The company is well prepared to further meet high demand for the iPhones.” That’s despite CEO Rene Obermann admitting on TV that Christmas demand could outstrip supply (via Dow Jones).
We await UK sales figures, though, without naming a source, The Mirror seems to have found out that iPhones sold “a rate of 4.2 per second at the height of the frenzy at 1,300 outlets”, while its Sunday stablemate expected “as many as 70,000″ sales from O2, Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Carphone shops over the weekend and “more than 400,000” approaching Christmas. O2 had pledged to create 727 jobs to handle new-customer calls and Carphone may be looking to reward its staff for dealing with a hoped-for influx – on iPhone Friday, it issued six million new shares to the market, reserved for employees (see announcement).