Over the past few weeks there has been much talk of a deal between Apple and the world’s largest mobile carrier, China Mobile. Apple’s CEO had a meeting with carrier recently in China, on the other hand China Mobile reiterated that it is keen on selling the iPhone, adding that various commercial and technical issues in the way of a deal. The deal wasn’t announced at the media event yesterday, but it might be made public in the near future. A regulatory body in China has now granted Apple a network access license for the iPhone, thus allowing it to sell its smartphones through China Mobile.
China’s Telecom Equipment Certification Center granted the license on Wednesday. The iPhone can now run on China Mobile’s proprietary network standard. Apple has officially sold the iPhone through both China Unicom and China Telecom in the past, it wasn’t able to get its smartphone on China Mobile due to the carrier’s different network standard. Even though the license has been granted, analysts believe that the launch might not take place until November. China Mobile is in the process of rolling out its TD-LTE network, the rollout is expected to be completed in the next couple of months, after which it is likely that Apple and China Mobile’s iPhone deal will finally be announced.
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