Vodafone Australia has revised its launch timing for the BlackBerry Storm to ensure it can meet demand from across Australia. Vodafone says that it has ordered a second shipment of BlackBerry Storm and will begin selling the smartphone from Vodafone retailers on Friday, December 5, 2008.

On Thursday, November 27, Vodafone will email all prospective customers who have pre-registered for BlackBerry Storm, inviting them to complete their Storm purchase online. In addition to receiving a promotional 8GB microSD card, online customers may also receive their device a day before the official in-store launch date of December 5, because customers buying online will receive their Storm by special courier direct from the warehouse.

“BlackBerry Storm has sparked the imagination and anticipation of Vodafone customers around the world,” said Russell Hewitt, CEO at Vodafone Australia. “In the UK, we’ve been selling a Vodafone Storm every 13 seconds, and on the basis of demand from our pre-registration process, which is well into the thousands, we’re expecting demand to be just as hot here in Australia.”

Last week, Vodafone Australia announced that it would heavily subsidise the BlackBerry Storm in Australia to provide it to customers for $0 while offering Vodafone customers unlimited BlackBerry email and internet from as little as $69 per month, encouraging a deluge of online pre-registrations.

Source:cellular-news