SoftBank: You Can Have My iPhone Exclusivity Agreement When You Pry It From My Cold, Dead Hands

SoftBank gained more than a quarter of a million new subscribers in June–largely because of Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone. The company–the iPhone’s exclusive carrier in Japan–said today that it added a net 229,500 subscribers for the month, far more than the country’s biggest provider, NTT DoCoMo, which reported a gain of 164,000.

SoftBank didn’t say what percentage of those new subscribers purchased iPhones, but it was likely significant, given deluge of pre-orders and massive lines for the iPhone 4 when it first arrived at market. Said a SoftBank spokesperson, “The release of the new iPhone contributed to subscriber gains.”

It most certainly did. According to Tokyo-based MM Research Institute, 1.7 million iPhones were sold in Japan in the fiscal year to March 31. That’s 72 percent of all smartphones sold. SoftBank is going to milk its iPhone exclusive as long as it can.