Over here in the United Kingdom if you want an iPhone you can walk into just about any phone shop and get one no matter which carrier you prefer, but over in the good ole US of A as you know it’s not that straightforward. For a donkey’s age AT&T have exclusivity over the iPhone, then Apple finally delivered the Verizon iPhone, and you can now get unlocked iPhone handsets, but surely the next step for Apple is to bring their iOS smartphone to the third largest carrier in the US, Sprint.

Sprint runs on CDMA the same as Verizon so delivering the iPhone to Sprint shouldn’t be a hardship for Apple, and according to an article over on Barrons, Shing Yin, an analyst for Citadel Securities believes that it is increasingly likely that Apple will deliver the iPhone to the Sprint network.

According to Yin both AT&T and Verizon are unlikely to try and delay Sprint gaining the iPhone for any legal reasons and believes that Sprint could see the iPhone before Christmas and remarks, “we see little reason for Apple to hold back.”

The analyst further writes, “With lower prices on plans, a Sprint iPhone could offer an attractive proposition for more price-conscious users (a demographic that we think is increasingly important to Apple following the rise of Android),” and “could be a relatively stronger seller than the Verizon iPhone.”

Makes perfect sense to me, Apple continues to fight the rise of Android with Android winning the market share battle in the US, so obviously Apple could increase their market share simply by delivering the iPhone to Sprint.

According to the guys over at 9to5 Mac, Sprint has some 51 million customers, a portion of which could switch to the iPhone if made available, and probably a portion not to be overlooked, and the arrival of the iPhone would also benefit Sprint.

Furthermore according to 9to5 Mac, Apple’s Tim Cook has already made it clear that Apple doesn’t want the iPhone to be for the rich only, something they say could mean that Sprint’s prepaid users might get a cheaper version of the iPhone leaving Verizon and AT&T to fight it out in the contracts market.

Of course Apple could bring the iPhone to Sprint on contract as well and offer a cheaper iPhone to all three carriers to grab a hefty share of the prepaid market. Either way, delivering an iPhone to Sprint isn’t going to hurt Apple in any way.

Obviously Sprint gaining the iPhone by Christmas for now is still just speculation, but what do our readers think, is it about time Apple bit the bullet and brought the iPhone to Sprint customers?