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Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Apple, made this announcement during a press conference, with the aim of ending the rumours about the iPhone 4’s reception issue.

According to the firm, the case should solve the widely reported problems in which calls were dropping and the strength of its signal was reduced when the Smartphone was used in a particular way.

Jobs said that reception problems are a widespread issue with Smartphones, and went on say Apple is “not perfect”.

IPhone 4 owners can sign up for their case via Apple’s website. However, Jobs stated that as Apple cannot make enough cases for every customer, they would find an alternate supplier to offer a wide range of them. The offer remains open until 30^th September.

Taking into account the retail price of an iPhone case, it is estimated that the giveaway is likely to cost Apple £188m.

Jobs also offered to reimburse customers who were still not happy with their iPhone’s performance.

Van Baker, vice president of IT research firm Gartner, told the BBC:

“They had to do something.

"The buzz kept getting louder and louder and louder and the evidence kept mounting more and more and more. They just couldn't ignore it."

The announcement was a response to increasing criticism about the phone’s performance. The problem appears to be with the steel band around the handset’s case, which contains the phone’s antennas. Handling the phone in a particular way reduces the strength of the reception, but fitting the phone with a case or affixing ‘bumpers’ to it resolves the issue.

It is not the only criticism levelled at the iPhone; some have claimed that the handset is too fragile. A writer for a prominent technology blog wrote how he dropped his on the day he purchased it, only to see the case shatter beyond repair. This illustrates the need for comprehensive mobile phone insurance as such damage is not covered by the iPhone’s warranty.

During the conference, Jobs had claimed that the problem was not isolated to the iPhone alone, but among Smartphones in general.

Claiming that the latest generation iPhone only dropped 1% more calls than the last, he said: “This has been blown so out of proportion, it's incredible.” Does this highlight the need for iPhone insurance more so then with the oldest version?