The long-awaited Apple iPhone 3G has reached the Southern tip of Africa thanks to Vodacom, on last week Friday. The phone will be available to both prepaid and contract consumers, and for the latter, the operator has created special tariffs dedicated to the iPhone which offers SMS, inclusive minutes, and data.

The iPhone 3G will be available at R6389.00 for the 8GB version, and R7569.00 for the 16GB version, if bought on prepaid. On contract, the phone will cost anywhere from R1,799 to R2,189 for the 8GB version, and from R2,899 to R3,299 for the 16GB version.

There will be three contracts: Plan 120s, 240, and 500s, where the number stands for the number of inclusive minutes freely available. All contracts will contain 100 free SMS, and 250MB of data, which is quite poor considering most of urbanized South Africa is covered by HSDPA. Out of bundle data rate is R1.50 per MB.

Press release after the break.

Vodacom will launch the iPhone 3G on September 26th Vodacom South Africa announced that iPhone 3G will be available through Vodaworld, Midrand from 00:00 on 26 September 2008. The revolutionary iPhone 3G will be available to both Vodacom's Prepaid and Contract customers in all major cities, from participating Vodacom outlets, across South Africa.

iPhone 3G combines all the revolutionary features of iPhone plus 3G networking that is twice as fast*, built-in GPS for expanded location-based mobile services and iPhone 2.0 software which runs thousands of third party applications available through the Apple App Store and includes support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync.

Pricing
Vodacom will be making iPhone 3G available to all Prepaid and Contract customers. Contract customers can choose between Vodacom's new iPhone 120s, iPhone 240 and iPhone 500s Contract packages to get the iPhone 3G at special prices, with great tariffs for voice, SMS and data. Depending on the choice of package, iPhone 3G is available from just R1799 for the 8GB model on an iPhone 500s package, or from R2899 for the 16GB model on the same package.

Prepaid customers can purchase the 8GB iPhone 3G for a cash price of R6389.00 and a 16GB iPhone 3G for a cash price of R7569.00.

Contract customers will be offered up to 250 MB data, as well 100 SMSs included in the price of the relevant iPhone 3G package. All Vodacom's iPhone 3G packages make provision for domestic call tariffs and once the plan's monthly limit for data usage has been exceeded, data usage will be charged at R1.50 per MB and standard SMS rates will apply. The table below provides a full overview.

	Plan 120s	Plan 240	Plan 500s
Monthly Payment	ZAR 450	ZAR 595	ZAR 925
Inclusive Minutes	120	240	500
Inclusive SMS	100	100	100
Inclusive Data	250 MB	250 MB	250 MB
Retail Price 8GB	ZAR 2,189	ZAR 2,189	ZAR 1,799
Retail Price 16GB	ZAR 3,299	ZAR 3,299	ZAR 2,899

All prices inclusive of taxes.

"We are delighted to offer our customers the revolutionary iPhone 3G." said Shameel Joosub, Managing Director, Vodacom South Africa. With iPhone 3G we can further fulfill our strategy to deliver compelling and engaging internet services via mobile, to our customers. With special data tariffs to make browsing the Internet economical, Vodacom customers will have a great experience and excellent value tariff packages."

All Vodacom South Africa customers can continue to register on the Vodacom website to receive exclusive information about the new iPhone 3G.

Customers can visit www.vodacom.co.za or www.vodacomdirect.co.za for more information on store locations and various tariff plans. Staff at the designated Vodacom participating approved dealers and call centers is trained to help answer any iPhone related queries.