¿Dónde está el iPhone 3G?

Everyone knows it's hard to get your hands on a 3G iPhone. That's why the chance to see one in Spain proved irresistible for Natasha Lomas.

Last week I was invited on a two-day Telefónica press trip, with an agenda that promised a visit to the telecoms provider's new €600m HQ in Madrid, strategy presentations from a trio of senior execs and an afternoon of R&D demos.

So far, so run-of-the-mill you could say - but also on the itinerary (indeed, topping the bill) was an 'Apple iPhone 3G session', with Steve Alder, general manager of devices for Telefónica Europe.

Even if this Steve wasn't The Other Steve, the 30 or so journalists from across Europe taking the time to get to know Telefónica clearly had high hopes for the hour-long session. But the attending press pack hoped in vain. It soon became clear that Steve Mark II had been meticulously briefed to tell us nothing we didn't already know.

We heard about the SDK; the enterprise benefits of licensing of Microsoft's ActiveSync protocol (aka getting push email, contacts, calendar); the fact 3G will mean the iPhone is faster - truly a revelation that one; the price cuts ("we want to get it into the hands of many more people"); the fact customer satisfaction is way above other devices; Super Monkey Ball coming to iPhone...

(What is the Spanish for déjà vu?)

This Steve didn't even have a 3G iPhone in his pocket - though he did reveal he is personally "testing one" at the moment (what a tease!). The closest we got to seeing the phone was the image projected on the screen behind him...

Photo credit: Natasha Lomas

And a screening of the ad, still with a US voiceover, that will launch 3G iPhone on 11 July. (In your best smug Apple voice think: 'At last the iPhone killer is here - aka the 3G iPhone'.)

Photo credit: Natasha Lomas

Nor was Steve brimming with answers in the lengthy Q&A session that followed. Lengthy because the roomful of journalists kept hoping one more question might just elicit an off-message answer.

But sadly no chink in the Apple-induced armour appeared, though I can confirm the exciting news that citizens of the Czech Republic and Telefónica markets in Latin America will be getting the iPhone before the end of the year.

Alder said Telefónica is one of the biggest partners for the iPhone - which doubtless means it has a very big interest in protecting its relationship with Apple. The company will be expanding its iPhone offering from two regions - the UK and Ireland - to 16, he added.

Why did O2 UK cut the price of the device? Apparently because customers are so happy with the shiny device, O2 wanted to get iPhones into the hands of even more people, to make them happy too.

How many iPhones has O2 UK sold to-date? "Lots. We're very pleased. We can't give you an exact number." Though Alder helpfully told us Apple has stated it has sold six million iPhones globally, and "clearly we're a part of that".

What sort of feedback has the company had from enterprise customers on the new business tariff? "The feedback so far has been phenomenal."

You get the picture.

Asked whether Telefónica is able to set iPhone tariffs itself, or whether it must consult with its supplier, Alder admitted there has to be an agreement with Apple. "It is a consultative process," he said - for which read "Apple calls the shots on this one".

"We have a very good working relationship with Apple," he added, before saying: "I don't want to get too deep into the commercial agreement with Apple."

He did however point out that Apple's chief operating officer has previously stated the company has shifted its operator strategy from a revenue-sharing model to a non-revenue sharing model.

So something else we already knew then.

Asked whether Nokia is developing an iPhone killer, Alder hedged: "Everyone is trying to develop an iPhone killer."

Of course, it's pretty hard to kill something you can't see - which may go some way to explaining the iPhone's absence from the trip. Conclusive proof then that the journalist's pen is mightier than the sword?

Perhaps realising the sense of frustration brewing in the assembled throng, one of O2's PRs took a chosen few of us aside and offered one-on-one chats with Steve over lunch during which, she assured us, we would be able to ask more questions and get hands on with an actual 3G iPhone - provided we sign a non-disclosure agreement first, agreeing to publish nothing before 11 July.

Seeing something - albeit, with conditions - is better than seeing nothing, so I duly agreed.

Yet lunch came and went without sight nor sound of iPhone. When I later asked the PR about the lunch briefing that never was, she told me Alder had had to be whisked away early to make sure he caught his 5:30pm flight as the Madrid traffic was "really bad". Perhaps Alder was running a Madrid traffic webcam widget on his iPhone - we can only speculate.

So OK, let's chalk that one down to 'unfortunate timing'.

However, on the bus back to the hotel, I overheard another member of the O2 PR team explaining the company's disappointment at not being able to show us the 3G iPhone. Apparently, so the story went, they had really wanted to - and had fought hard to do so - but in the end Apple had vetoed it.

So the trip did confirm something else: who calls the shots in that operator-supplier relationship. Muy interesante.