You can bet that when UMTS is deployed, Cingular will be deploying firmware upgrades on BlackBerry because they are playing catch-up to Verizons' BroadbandAccess.
It's totally possible that there'll be less time between the 8700 release and the UMTS upgrade, than the time between the 7250 release and the EVDO upgrade (Which was a painful 9 month wait!).
Many of us knew that the 7250 supported EVDO. Forum searches on "7250 EVDO" on posts with a date before 3 months ago, clearly show that. The specifications sheet for chips used in the 8700 clearly show UMTS support -- RIM has publicly revealed the chip, and then cross-referencing with Intel specifiation publicly reveals UMTS support. So this is public info. On top of this, UMTS on the 8700 is talked about among executives quite a lot more publicly than 7250 and EVDO.
It is still a wait, but well within the product lifecycle of the 8700, and possibly earlier than many think.
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