Oh Snap! If you were rumored to be the wireless company to be offered the iPhone, you turned it down and the iPhone went on to become that most talked-about phone ever, would you be ranting about Apple as well?
That’s what Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg told the Financial Times (free registration required) when asked about the iPhone becoming a huge success.
“There goes the conspiracy again,” he says of Apple. “You’re declaring them a winner before they’ve earned it on the field.”
Mr Jobs has no monopoly on innovation, says Mr Seidenberg, whose bullishness about Verizon Wireless’ future rests partly on his assertion that the mobile phone is “the most disruptive thing in business”.
Wait, it gets better. He goes on to say that he can’t wait for Steve Jobs to retire.
As handsets become banking tools and games controllers, he argues, mobile operators can up-end other companies’ business models. “It’s very cool. And Steve Jobs eventually will get old . . . I like our chances.”
(imitating cat hisses)
He also goes on about Vodafone, FiOS, and there recent acquisition of Alltel. The whole article is basically a therapeutic rant from Verizon CEO Seidenberg.