Tom Meredith, chief financial officer with Motorola, admitted that Apple's move to include WiFi in the iPhone is forcing mobile operators to seriously consider selling devices with WiFi capability included. Motorola, according to Meredith, has not been able to convince service providers to allow WiFi connectivity--until now.
"Carriers didn't want to have anything to do with WiFi," Meredith said during the 14th Annual Citigroup Technology Conference. "They are now coming around to WiFi as an optional feature, recognizing the inevitability."
AT&T has always had a habit of disabling WiFi capability in devices, except of course in the iPhone. In July, Research in Motion revealed that AT&T would be the first customer of the 8820 WiFi/cellular BlackBerry device.
Meredith also said operators were previously opposed to touchscreen devices, but that the iPhone has changed that game too.
For more about Motorola's comments regarding the iPhone:
- read this article from EE Times