The HTC 10, a phone that is by all means one of the best Android phones of the year and HTC’s best by a mile in about four, has been axed from T-Mobile’s line-up after just two months. At least, that’s what we are left to believe after the phone disappeared from T-Mobile’s site back in July and never returned.
In July, when the absence of the phone was pointed out by reddit users who were also told the phone was no longer for sale, T-Mobile said to Tmonews that it would be back and the missing listing was just a glitch. Except, the phone is still gone and stores seem to be running out of inventory, according to Android Police, with no plans to re-stock. The store listing for the HTC 10 on T-Mobile’s site is also now redirecting to a generic HTC page instead of the HTC 10, as if T-Mobile is scrubbing all history of the phone.
A flagship phone like this being booted after just two months is sort of unheard of. The Amazon Fire Phone and Blackberry Priv seem to have lasted longer than that in the industry, and those phones are bonafide flops. But this move is also a terrible sign for HTC because AT&T didn’t even carry the phone at any time. At this point, Verizon and Sprint still sell the 10, though it has shifted to Verizon’s 2nd page, below the lowly HTC Desire 530 and last year’s DROID phones.
What does this mean for HTC? Probably not much new. HTC has been struggling for years and even though the HTC 10 is a really good phone, it was never setup for success. Again, AT&T didn’t want anything to do with it out of the gate and they are the second largest US carrier. HTC also has what appears to be zero marketing budget, priced the phone at a ridiculous $700 off contract, and the company is more interested in virtual reality these days than smartphones.
If anything, this news sucks for HTC fans, if there are any left.
Via: reddit | Tmonews | Android Police
This post was last modified on August 12, 2016 10:55 am