Sprint Nextel Corp. said on Tuesday that it had unintentionally overstated the launch day sales of the much predictable EVO 4G phone from HTC Corp, which is hyped as a serious contestant to Apple's iPhone 4.

Sprint said on Tuesday that the total number of HTC EVO 4G pieces sold on the launch day was in order with the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices that were sold over their initial three days on the market jointly.

The firm at first reported that the total number of HTC EVO 4G devices sold on launch day was three times more the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices that had been sold over their initial three days on the market combined.

BTIG analyst, Walter Piecyk said he was reducing his approximation for EVO sales in the initial weekend to 150,000 from his previous approximation of 250,000 to 300,000.

In addition, calls to 20 plus stores today point that the phone is in shortage of the supply, so it is not expected that the number will by any chance see a significant increase in the first week of sales, Piecyk said.

The No. 3 U. S. wireless service supplier said that it vend out six times more EVO phones on the launch date than Instinct phones from Samsung Electronics.