ChiefExecutive Daniel Mead said in an interview at the company's New Jerseyheadquarters that demand for the phone has been at record levels since VerizonWireless began selling the phone on its website Feb. 3.
Mead toldReuters that the lack of long lines outside Verizon Wireless stores on Feb. 10,the day it hit store shelves, could be attributed to the fact that about 60 percent of the company's iPhone sales were made on its website.
Theexecutive said the device had helped substantially increase the rate at whichcustomers switched to Verizon Wireless from all its other U.S.rivals.
At peak sales times Mead said iPhone brought 100 times moreorders than usual to its website but he did not give specificnumbers.
Mead reaffirmed the company's guidance that it would sell asmany as 11 million iPhones in 2011. He said the company would give specificiPhone sales figures when it reports first-quarter earnings.
"This isthe largest retail launch we've seen," the executive said. "When I look over thelast three weeks or so it (sold) much more than we've seen in any previousdevice."
Verizon's iPhone launch ended AT&T Inc's more than threeyears of exclusive U.S. rights to sell the device.
AT&T wasplagued with complaints about its network's performance due to the strain ofadditional data traffic from iPhone users. Verizon said its network wasperforming well despite additional data traffic from iPhone.
However,Verizon Wireless has not been immune to iPhone reception problems caused by thephone's antenna, according to Consumer Reports. The influential nonprofitorganization, which publishes guides on everything from cars to TVs, said onFriday that holding the Verizon iPhone "in a specific but quite natural way" cancause the phone to drop calls.
But Mead said the company's droppedcall rate for iPhones was only 0.5 per cent.
In a separate interviewon Friday, Verizon Wireless vice president for network planning Nicola Palmersaid the company had been preparing for the device for more than ayear.
This involved sending Verizon Wireless engineers out to Apple'sCalifornia headquarters as often as once a week during that period, theexecutive said.
She said the company was seeing data usage rates fromthe iPhone similar to those of Verizon customers who use phones that run onGoogle Inc's Android software.
Palmer declined to say when Verizonwould get an iPhone on its new high-speed network, which is based on atechnology known as Long-Term Evolution. (LTE) But she said the company wouldbring out more Apple products.
"I fully anticipate we'll be workingon more things down the road (with Apple)," Palmer said. "It's a partnership ...we'll continue to develop it."
Verizon Wireless is a joint venture ofVerizon Communications Inc and Vodafone Group Plc.
Shares in VerizonCommunications ended the day up 1.1 per cent at $35.97, and held steady inafter-hours trading.
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