Q&A: Apple's Steve Jobs and AT&T's Randall Stephenson
With the much-awaited iPhone set to launch Friday, Apple CEO Steve Jobs and AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson spoke with me about the hotly-desired phone. An edited transcript follows. — Q: IPhone Day is finally here. How do you feel?
Context & Ripple Effects
The interview lands on the eve of Friday's iPhone launch, capping weeks of build-up: Apple's rivals had already begun answering the iPhone earlier this month, and just days ago Hollywood was scrambling to fit its content into the iPhone's form factor. The joint appearance of both CEOs is itself a signal — Apple supplies the hardware and brand pull, AT&T supplies exclusive network access, and neither could stage this launch without the other.
The syndicated pickup is unusually broad for an executive Q&A: CNET ran multiple follow-ups, including Jobs hinting at wireless music downloads on the phone and free iPhones for employees, while the New York Times and Wall Street Journal both seized on Jobs conceding that web surfing on AT&T's network isn't fast — a rare public trade-off acknowledgment hours before launch.
First-order effects
- Friday's launch puts AT&T's exclusivity into immediate effect: every buyer must take AT&T service, making Stephenson's carrier the sole beneficiary of demand that lines outside Apple stores — with campers drawing near-constant press interviews since morning — suggest is substantial.
- Jobs's concession that browsing on AT&T's network isn't fast frames the data-speed trade-off buyers accept today, putting pressure on AT&T's network reputation from day one.
Second-order effects
- Rivals who began responding earlier this month now face a launch-backed benchmark, forcing handset makers and carriers to counter with their own music-and-web devices rather than incremental feature-phone updates.
- Hollywood's rush to fit content to the screen gives Apple and AT&T leverage over media partners, since the device becomes the distribution bottleneck content owners must conform to.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, handset launches shift from carrier-driven product cycles to manufacturer-branded events, with carriers competing for exclusive rights rather than dictating specifications — a rebalancing of power between device maker and network operator whose durability is genuinely uncertain.
- A successful Apple-AT&T pairing would push wireless competition toward content-plus-connectivity bundles, pulling music labels, studios, and software platforms deeper into carrier strategy.
The trend: The iPhone launch marks the moment premium handsets begin to be sold on manufacturer brand and exclusive carrier partnerships rather than carrier product plans, with network speed becoming the accepted consumer trade-off.