- guardian.co.uk, Monday July 7 2008 17.23 BST
Demand for the new 3G version of the iPhone has outstripped supply, and O2, Apple's exclusive UK mobile phone partner, says it has run out of stock for customers wanting to pre-order the device before it goes on general release on Friday.
The new phone was made available for pre-order on the O2 website at 8am yesterday morning. The site crashed within the first hour due to the volume of traffic, and by Monday afternoon O2 said it had run out of pre-order stock.
Carphone Warehouse, the only independent retailer in the UK to stock the phone, says it still has stocks available to new O2 customers who wish to pre-order it. Existing customers wanting to upgrade an O2 handset to a new iPhone will have to wait until Friday.
Some of O2's rivals are speculating that the company limited supply in order to add to the hype of Friday's launch.
The company used similar tactics for the arrival of high-profile music acts such as Prince, who performed at London's O2 arena. In the past, the venue has released tickets on a show-by-show basis, even when an artist had signed up for many nights.
However O2 maintains that half the phones it ordered were made available for pre-order customers. It has given no details of how many phones it expects to stock in total.
It claims more than 200,000 people registered an interest in the 3G iPhone; 35,000 people registered interest in the previous version of the phone before it went on sale.
Carphone Warehouse reckons interest in the new phone is 10 times greater than it was for the original version, launched last November.
The 8GB version of the new phone — which can store about 2,000 songs — is free for customers willing to sign up for a year and a half at £45 per month, while the larger capacity 16GB phone is free for anyone on a £75-per-month deal.
