Verizon Smashes Sales Record With iPhone

Verizon Wireless sold out of iPhones just 17 hours after putting a limited number on sale for pre-order yesterday, smashing the company's sales record for any device, reports MarketWatch. In fact, the single-day record fell after only the first two hours—those being 3am to 5am. Verizon released no sales figures, "but judging from the server issues it was having immediately after making the handset available and the subsequent shutdown of advance pre-orders, we'll go ahead and guess it was 'a lot,'" writes Engadget. Normal sales begin Feb. 10.

One analyst tells Fortune that Verizon probably sold about 100,000 phones yesterday. Another figures that Verizon will sell about 3 million by the end of March and about 11.6 million this year. "Overall, it was a very good day," says a company official. "Yesterday's launch set the pace for next week when we open up sales to everyone across America." (More iPhone stories.)