Nexus 4 back on sale - but sold out in Spain, France, while UK, Australia wait
The Nexus 4 smartphone went back on sale in some markets yesterday — but it appears many customers who missed out on the device at last year's launch may miss out again.
Read this
The value-for-money 3G smartphone from LG went on sale last November, but sold out in the UK within hours and followed a similar pattern in the US and elsewhere.
The 8GB and 16GB models returned yesterday on Google Play in the US, Canada and Germany, shortly followed by the UK, France, Spain and Australia. A 16GB version is also slated for release from "all stores" at large Australian retailer Harvey Norman on February 1 on either as part of a mobile package or outright for $469.
It appears Google may have estimated demand for the smartphone better in some markets better than others this time around.
The Nexus 4 has already sold out in France and Spain, with both the 8GB and 16GB versions showing as "temporarily unavailable", while in Australia the two models will "ship soon", according to the local Google Play site.
The UK store is also showing both version as "ships soon", with the device scheduled to ship from one to two weeks after it becomes available (Google doesn't say when that might be, however). The 8GB Nexus 4, which runs Android Jelly Bean 4.2, costs £240 and the 16GB model costs £280 in the UK.
Shifting more Nexus 4s can't hurt LG's plans to smartphone plans to grow its smartphone revenues. During its Q4 earnings (PDF) yesterday, LG credited a 15 percent quarter-on-quarter rise in smartphone sales to $2.58bn in part to the Nexus 4, as well as its LTE Vu:2 and Optimus G, which is arriving in 50 new markets this year.