US 3G Apple iPhone Confirmed

AT&T’s CEO Randall Stephenson was quoted by Bloomberg yesterday at a meeting of the Churchill Club in Santa Clara, California as saying that the 3G iPhone will be available sometime in 2008. Stephenson was asked about when the 3G version of the popular handset would be available and responded, “You’ll have it next year.”

AT&T’s 3G network operates on the 850/1900MHz WCDMA bands, which are different from the 2100MHz used by the rest of the world. When asked about the lack of 3G in the current iPhone, Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, maintained that reduced battery life was the main concern. The question remains, will a 3G iPhone be tri-band 3G, or will Apple create 2 different versions, one for the US, and one for the rest of the world?