I was able to talk to someone from Orange UK, and here is the statement they game me:

“Orange UK is committed to providing the BlackBerry Bold to its customers in the UK, however Orange UK and RIM are currently working on providing a maintenance release of software to address some reported 3G related concerns. Although the reported 3G concerns have been limited to a minority of Orange customers in the UK, Orange UK and RIM both take customer concerns very seriously and felt it was prudent to introduce a maintenance release of software for Orange UK customers at this time. Orange UK and RIM apologise to customers for any inconvenience and expect to provide a software maintenance release soon.”

Sounds solid!