Deutsche Telekom to sell iPad 2 in own stores in Germany, Austria, Greece, Poland and the Netherlands? [UPDATE: Vodafone, too]

UPDATE 1 [Tuesday, August 30, 2011 at 4:07 PM]: Macerkopf.de is reporting that Vodafone will also sell iPad 2 in their own retails stores across Germany. And iPadClub.nl has it on good authority that Vodafone is going to do the same in the Netherlands, along with a dedicated iPad corner. Plus, something’s obviously up with big carriers making announcements the same day as SetteB.IT informed us that Vodafone just announced iPad 2 Wi-Fi + 3G availability in Italy.

Deutsche Telekom, Europe’s largest telecommunications company headquartered in Bonn, Germany, will reportedly begin selling 3G version of Apple’s iPad 2 directly in their retail stores across Germany, Austria, Greece, Poland and the Netherlands. iFun.de explained this morning that even though the wireless operator has had 3G data tariffs for iPad 2 owners for some time in their offering, they have never gotten to actually selling the hardware themselves.

The site stopped short of providing availability or pricing information and noted Deutsche Telekom is expected to make an announcement in due time. This is no doubt great news for Apple which saw its global footprint for iOS gadgets increase substantially under Tim Cook’s watch. Apple operates five stores in Germany and is planning to open at least four new stores in the country this year alone. The company does not yet have stores in Austria, Greece, Poland and the Netherlands and instead relies on authorized resellers to push their products in those and other markets.

People familiar with Apple’s inner workings usually attribute the ever-growing global distribution network for iOS devices to its long-standing operations chief Timothy Cook, now the new CEO. Cook referred to iPad in a March conference call with analysts as “the mother of all backlogs”, alluding to high demand for the device. Apple has literally been selling every iPad it could make. In fact, the company only recently improved shipping times to 24 hours on its online store in the U.S. and Canada.