With sightings of their tell-tale white earphone cord now more common than ever, you could be forgiven for thinking that there is no one left who does not own an iPod.

Now Apple has confirmed this hunch, yesterday announcing the official sales figures for the iPod so far.

More than 300 million iPods have been sold since the gadget’s launch in November 2001 – equivalent to everyone in England owning six of the popular music player.

To ensure such high sales continue, Apple has taken steps to enhance production of the iPod nano and iPod shuffle by signing £1.25 billion worth of contracts for NAND flask memory chips.

“We want to be able to produce as many of our wildly popular iPods as the market demands,” said Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

© 2005 Adfero Ltd