Verizon CFO: We're getting the iPad too

Verizon Communications Inc. CFO Francis J. Shammo today told Bloomberg that Verizon Wireless will sell a version of the iPad that can connect directly to its network.

Really?

If so, why wasn't it announced at the big Verizon press conference today in New York?

My guess that Shammo's comment was "off script" and that a certain CEO in Cupertino is probably a little pissed off about it. If a Verizon iPad were officially blessed it would have been mentioned in today's press conference and in a big red press release.

Will there be any repercussions from Shammo's slip of the lips? I doubt it. Anyone could have guessed that Apple would also partner with Verizon on the iPad, it only makes sense now that they're doing an iPhone together.

With two of the biggest Apple rumors of the past decade behind us (The Beatles on iTunes and the Verizon iPhone) we can finally move on and start looking forward to new rumors, like the iPad 2 - coming to Verizon!

The real question is whether Apple will ship the AT&T and VZW iPads as two separate SKUs or if they've managed to squeeze both chipsets inside one iPad -- which would be ideal. Buy the iPad and activate it on whatever carrier you prefer. Apple should go the extra mile and include the international 3G bands too, while it's at it.

Shammo declined to say exactly when an iPad might materialize on Verizon and the rumors are all over the place.

Conservatively one could deduce that Apple would release the iPad 2 in April -- one year after the original. Digg founder Kevin Rose posted that “Apple will be announcing the iPad 2 in the next 3-4 weeks, possibly Tuesday February 1st.”