Report: Apple, AT&T Talking 3G MacBook Deal

Ed Sutherland ()

Report: Apple, AT&T Talking 3G MacBook DealAT&T, after using the iPhone to salvage its fourth-quarter revenue, is in talks with Apple to team up for a 3G data service aimed at MacBook owners, reports said Thursday.

At the heart of the speculation is a brief comment to Fortune by the carrier’s Emerging Devices group president Glenn Lurie. Lurie said he’s talked recently with interim Apple CEO Tim Cook.

“I would very much like to do more business with Apple, and I hope that we do,” Lurie said Wednesday. Although the AT&T executive said he was having similar conversations with other companies, Apple has been an especially profitable partner.

The implication is that AT&T is seeking to expand its lineup of subsidized data devices to Apple’s MacBook portable computers. Earlier this month, the carrier announced it would subsidize a Sony digital camera and a Dell Inspiron Mini 9 netbook. In the case of the Dell computer, reported Fortune, the usual $449 price would fall to $99 if owners also sign-up for AT&T’s data plan.

Despite taking a $450 million bite from AT&T’s fourth quarter earnings, it’s net profit falling to $2.4 billion in 2008 from $3.1 billion in 2007, the carrier sees the heavily-subsized iPhone as an attractive profit center.

Wednesday, AT&T said the 1.9 million iPhone subscribers added during the quarter provide 60 percent more revenue than ‘feature phone’ subscribers.

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However, this isn’t the first time Apple has considered creating 3G-ready MacBooks. The Cupertino, Calif.-based company has mulled the idea since 2007, according to Apple Insider. Apple CEO Steve Jobs had balked at being tied to one carrier for MacBook wireless services, the site noted.

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About the author

Ed Sutherland

Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.

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  • NoPCZone

    Not if the carrier is AT&T- not today, tomorrow or ever.

    This is the company that handed over private data on customers to the NSA without a FISA Court Oder- a blatantly illegal act. If they do not care for their customers and are willing to break the law that readily, I will have nothing to do with them if I can in any way avoid it.

    Some of us value the Constitution, civil liberties and our right to privacy. Many of us vote with out wallet. That is the only reason I do not have an iPhone.

  • Matt

    Here here!

  • bud

    3g is not the time or amount if available bandwidth to have such a radio built in to a laptop, PLUS, any radio in a laptop should not be tied to a single carrier.

    If ATT wants to do this, they already have a way of selling such services as PCMCIA card Cellular modems with a data plan. Then when LTE comes into being, they can do the same thing. If they really want everyone to use it, provide it free of charge to all their cell customers.

    Right now, I imagine the other guys are cleaning their clocks in this segment because of faster networks.

    Hey ATT, there’s an idea! Spend your effort improving the speed of your network!