Of course they could, but it won't be called a Nexus 4. It will be some other name and in all likelihood, some other manufacturer with a completely different design. However, I don't think it will be coming to Verizon as long as they rely on CDMA.Couldn't they just release an updated phone? Thats what apple did with the iPhone 4
But the rules have turned out to be virtually meaningless in practice, as Verizon uses 700MHz in conjunction with CDMA spectrum that doesn?t have similar open access rules ? so while Verizon might be legally required to support an unlocked LTE device, the legacy CDMA network still effectively keeps all of Verizon?s phones locked.
[...] it's still a nascent technology with significant interoperability problems across many spectrum bands, requiring companies to create different hardware variants of their phones for each network. Profitably building all those variants requires either financial assistance from the carriers or a large addressable market for an unlocked device. So while Verizon has by far the largest LTE network in the world, covering over 400 markets and over 250 million people in the US, Google has no access to those customers.
Google may be getting serious about selling hardware with the Nexus 4, but not so serious that it's willing to compromise with carriers, and compromising with carriers is the only way to make LTE work.
?We certainly have a desire to offer devices on every carrier on the planet,? Rubin said. ?The tactical issue is GSM vs. LTE. A lot of the networks that have deployed LTE haven?t scaled completely yet ? they?re hybrid networks. They?ll do their old thing and they?ll do LTE, which means the devices need both radios built into them.?
?For now we?re gonna sit back and watch those networks evolve. Two radios in a device right now certainly raises the cost, and diminishes battery life.? This point seems to frustrate him. ?When we did the Galaxy Nexus with LTE we had to do just that, and it just wasn?t a great user experience. It?s possible to do it right, but that?s not where we?ll put our resources initially. Tactically, we want to make sure the devices are available for every network on the planet.?