22 August 2008 11:40 GMT / By Katie Scott
Days ago, there were rumours that the iPhone is soon going to land in Russia.Well Reuters is today confirming a deal between Mobile TeleSystems (MTS) in Russia and Apple.
"MTS has made an agreement with Apple on the sale of iPhones", the source said. "Sales are likely to begin in October."
When contacted by Reuters - Apple declined to comment as did a spokeswoman for Mobile TeleSystems (MTS), Russia's largest mobile phone operator which is controlled by Russian services conglomerate Sistema.
Apple is also believed to be in talks with two of the country's other telecoms giants - Vimpelcom and MegaFon but both declined to comment when asked at what stage of negotiations there were in with Apple.
Russia could be a massive market for Apple, where blackmarket iPhones are already becoming a status symbol in Moscow.
Reports suggest that around 20,000 of these illegally acquired iPhones are being sold each month and industry experts say the number of iPhones operating in Russia could total 700,000 by the end of 2008.
In the meantime, the iPhone has arrived in Poland but the telecoms company with the exclusive contract wasn't expecting the massive interest we saw in the UK and US.
In fact, Orange was so worried about losing face that it actually paid actors to line up in the queues for the phone.
"We have these fake queues at front of 20 stores around the country to drum up interest in the iPhone", a spokesman unabashedly told Reuters. Phones, Mobile phones, iPhone, Apple, Biz, Rumours
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