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Orange France is the sole provider if the iPhone to the French people. It has, according to the carrier, moved over 96,000 of these smartphones since launching the iPhone last November, reports Pocket-lint.co.uk.

14 percent of this total were unlocked, meaning they weren't setup for use on Orange's network and with one of the carrier's iPhone data and voice plans. Due to French law, Orange had to give consumers the option of buying the iPhone unlocked—almost anywhere else the iPhone must be hacked to become unlocked.

Freedom has a price, however; an unlocked iPhone costs considerably more than the one that's tied to Orange's network.

Orange sold about 70,000 iPhones during its first month of availability. Meaning it has sold less than 30,000 since. If Orange is going to meet its goal of selling 400,000 to 500,000 iPhones this year, sales have got to pick up considerably.

Perhaps the release of a 3G iPhone is just what Orange needs to pick things up. After all, slow EDGE cellular-wireless technology may be good enough for many iPhone users in the U.S., where Wi-Fi hotspots are common, but it is ancient technology in Europe, where 3G wireless is far more established and Wi-Fi outside the home is not nearly as ubiquitous has in this country.

Or, Orange may want to take a tact similar to that purveyor of the iPhone in Germany, T-Mobile: drop the price of the drastically. You can now get the 8GB iPhone for only €99 - equivalent to about $155 - with a contract from T-Mobile. That's way down from the previous asking price of €399 and, it has been speculated, a possible indication of a 3G iPhone on the near horizon. The 16GB iPhone still goes for €499, however.

Last month, O2 asserted the iPhone was the "company's fastest selling device it has ever had in the UK." No details were given, though.

An analysis of Apple and AT&T's sales numbers last year revealed that the companies could not account for more than 1 in 4 iPhones. That's a little more than a million of the 4 million iPhones Apple shipped in 2007.

Apple has often stated it would like to ship 10 million iPhones in 2008.