And the wait just goes on and on and on…. If you live in one of the countries that have been granted the blessed honor of an international roll out of the iPad this month, you’re going to have to learn to hold your breath even longer. The initial intention was to have a simultaneous global release just after the US. However, demand was so high that the rest of the world had to wait. They were then promised their wonder devices by the end of May, but the latest news reveals yet another set back, this time to the tail end of June.
Apple is now planning a double roll out in the nine chosen countries: the UK, France, Australia, Canada, Italy, Germany, Spain, Japan and Switzerland. If you live in any of these countries and have already pre-ordered your iPad, your iPad will arrive as promised by May 28th. However, if you’ve been a bit slow off the mark and have yet to place an order, you are set to suffer a longer wait yet. Sources from Apple suggest that the second wave of roll out will happen around June 28th.
July marks the third roll out to: Austria, Belgium, Luxemburg, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Mexico, Hong Kong and Singapore. I do find it a little curious that the Euro zone roll out is not happening all at the same time. Surely within the single European market, once the iPad is available in France, you’ll be able to order one to be shipped to the neighboring countries of Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands or Luxemburg?
A spokesperson for Apple wrote on the tech blog ‘Pocket Lint’: “Demand for iPad has been off the charts. We are working hard to get iPads into customers’ hands as quickly as possible”. Mmmmm well not quick enough for the world outside of the US it seems!
I get the whole idea of ‘just in time’ production, with manufacturers not wanting to burden themselves with tons of unsold stock. Surely Apple did a least a little bit of market research before launching the iPad? Didn’t this research give them a clue just how popular their new device was going to be? Evidently not! Steve Jobs should think himself lucky that the iPad is a unique device at the moment; otherwise impatient customers might just have started looking elsewhere by now.
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