Fortune posted a story by Scott Moritz (who has helped spread rumors of iPhone numbers before) on Monday claiming Apple has already sold 3 Million iPhones. This number doesn't seem too far fetched. The iPhone 3G is available in many more countries than the original phone and is still sold out in many states here in the US. What is interesting is where this figure comes from:
One month after its debut, Apple's new iPhone has hit the 3 million sold mark, according to analyst Michael Cote of the Cote Collaborative.Michael Cote, 'eh? Cote Collaborative? Fine. I haven't heard of every analyst out there, so that's no big deal. It goes on:
"They are seeing unprecedented demand," says Cote, adding that there appears to be no signs of a let up yet. Cote, a former T-Mobile executive, has been extremely accurate with wireless predictions in the past.Okay, now you've caught my interest a bit. He has been extremely accurate with wireless predictions in the past? Searching Google for "Cote Collaborative" returns mostly results for the recent iPhone story as well as a link to cotecollaborative.com which is a page that is currently parked by GoDaddy. Interesting.
Searching Google for "Michael Cote" brings back 21,000 results, the top of which include: Michael Cote Music, Michael Cote from Grandbury, Texas, and Michael Cote of Redmonk. Towards the bottom of the first page of results we see results related to the Fortune story. Searching Google News doesn't turn up much besides the Fortune story either.
Searching for "Michael Cote T-Mobile" did turn up the following information:
Michael Cote is an Independent Telecommunications Consultant. He specializes in enterprise mobility, sales and distribution strategy, online strategy, smart phones, and customer care and billing. Mr. Cote has over 15 years of sales, marketing, and operational experience in the telecommunications industry.Apparently he worked at T-Mobile as a VP of Business Sales and Operations from 2001-2005 and since then has been an Independent Consultant. So we know he was in fact employed with T-Mobile, but what about these other predictions that he has been so accurate with? I haven't found any evidence of those so far. He gave a presentation on Feb. 8, 2007 on "iPhone's Impact on All Things Wireless", but there is little information about the specifics in that presentation.
Results also turned up that a team lead by Mr. Cote while he was at T-Mobile was nominated for an American Business Award:
Michael Cote began his career at T-Mobile in 2001 as VP of Wireless Data Sales and Operations. Michael successfully built out Channel Management (focused on wireless data), Technical Sales and NSA (focused on enterprise business) and expanded his role to include General Business (focused on small to mid-sized business), when promoted to Vice President of Direct Sales in 2002.Nice, but still no evidence of previous predictions or how he would have knowledge of Apple sales. I have also not found any evidence of Cote Collaborative other than the parked page. While I have just started my searching, this is somewhat interesting. Has anyone else been able to find anything significant that I'm missing? Let me know in the comments.
I don't doubt that he has knowledge of the wireless industry, but why would Scott Moritz use this guy's claim? It seems to have come from nowhere with no real evidence or explanation (other than it's popular). In fact, I think Apple has sold 4 Million iPhone 3G's! Someone contact me for a story. Something about this just seems strange, but what do I know?
Also interesting (although not solely related I'm sure) is that Apple stock is up more than $7 since the news broke that Apple had sold 3 Million phones.
Thoughts?
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