First BlackBerry Storm rejected by Vodafone

RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis recently opened up a bit about the development process of the BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) Storm – apparently early models weren’t up to snuff for Vodafone (NYSE: VOD): “I thought that when we put Quadband EDGE and GPS and a powerful CPU and high-performance graphics cards on one tiny board – I figured that that was enough of a breakthrough and Vodafone sent me packing!” This history could be reflected in some of the first rumours of the BlackBerry Storm, which portrayed a less than stellar keypad, but according to early reviews everything has been nicely ironed over thanks in part to Vodafone. Many of Vodafone’s ads are touting that the BlackBerry 9500 is custom-built for them, and I guess this is exactly what they’re talking about.

RIM has traditionally been fairly conservative in their releases, but by taking a few hints from their carrier partners, they’re obviously learning a thing or two.

[via Pocket-Lint]