The iPhone 5 had more than 2 million handsets sold in China in the three days following its launch.
"Customer response to the iPhone 5 in China has been incredible, setting a new record with our best first weekend sales ever in China," Apple CEO Tim Cook said in astatement issued on Monday.
It seems that iPhones in China cost $150 to $200 more than in the US because of taxes, tarriffs, fees, etc...
Despite the common misconception, China is actually a very highly regulated country with a massive bureaucracy and taxes and fees on everything.
They might still be catching up on the enforcement of environmental and workforce safety regulations, and wages might be lower, but less bureaucracy is definitely not a motivating factor for companies coming to China!
And folks are willing to pay extra for a real iPhone for several reasons. First, as a status symbol -- as the country gets richer, there are always folks who want to show that off.
Second, a real iPhone comes with support, all the latest features, etc... etc... -- I don't know how good the fake iPhones are, but I'd suspect that they're not that great.
Finally, the real thing feels different. Even if you absolutely can't tell the difference. If you're wearing fake jewelry, even if nobody can tell the difference, you know it's not the same as wearing real diamonds and emeralds.
A copy of a Picasso -- no matter how good and indistinguishable from the real thing -- is still a copy. If you know it's a copy, you're not going to pay millions for it.
I myself am a big fan of Diet Coke. I bought a six-pack of Diet Pepsi once and it tasted horrible. I couldn't drink it. Never again! Diet Coke or nothing else. But in a restaurant, where I get diet soda in a glass and don't know which it is, I can't taste the difference.
One of the evening comedy shows went out to see people's reaction to the new iPhone 5, and gave them an iPhone 4 (which they already had) and people STILL said the supposed "iPhone 5" was sleeker and faster and better.
Even without the improvements that came with the iPhone 5 (well, except for the maps), Apple's brand name is strong enough to make people want it. Emerging countries are no exception.
And yes, average salaries are low. But some salaries are already very high, many people are willing to save up for aspirational goods like iPhones -- and monthly telephone costs are lower, on top of it, so the total costs are not all that bad.
Well I may be wrong but I feel Apple i5 has not done justice for the hype it created before entering the market. I still use the 4s and I feel its good enough for me when you specially compare the i5 price along with the new features available on i5 compared to 4s.
in Shanghai, which is considered the most expensive city in China with the highest salaries, a monthly salary of 10000 RMB is considered to be really great, and not so many people get such money. In mainland China, the salaries much lower. So, how many people are ready to pay 4-6000 RMB to get a real Iphone if you can get a cheap fake that looks exactly like the real one?
Maria, that might be a reason, why Iphones are more expensive in Russia, where there are no Apple stores, but there ARE Apple stores in China, so I guess, if someone in Chine wants to buy an Iphone from the States, they would get it cheaper, otherwise it doesn't make sense- you can go to Apple store in China and get your own IPhone
"Still, the world's largest market should be a powerful pull to bring companies into China and even maybe relax prices a bit to get that market going."
When has the Chinese Market becomes the World's largest market?
That;s true Maria. However I came across this analysis of why the iPhone 5 may be is built just for the Chinese market:
"The iPhone 5, however, has been built to support the frequency bands that China Mobile adopts for its homegrown 3G networks, paving the way for the deal to be inked by early 2013 — a development analysts say could double sales of iPhones in China. Compatibility aside, the new iPhone offering also has features which appeal to the Chinese consumers, said Scott Sutherland, managing director of equity research at Wedbush Securities.What you get with the iPhone 5 are all these new features: Chinese language integration, social networking websites, Siri is going to be in Chinese, so again, they're making a big focus on the software functionalities of this phone," said Sutherland, which has a 12-month target of $885 for Apple's stock."
I have always looked at this picture from a differnet angle. I think its unfair in the first place to comapre the Iphone (a phone) to Android (an OS). its one phone against many phones (more than a 100) so even despite the encouraging numbers Apple seems to have accomplished, in reality NO other phone singlehandedly completes with the iphone.
Lower prices will probably be the most attractive motivator around the world, where 'status' is not such a big selling point as it might be in the U.S. or Europe. Still, the world's largest market should be a powerful pull to bring companies into China and even maybe relax prices a bit to get that market going.
One reason is that iPhones in China are more expensive than those in the US, so you get folks buying them here and shipping them to China. In fact, a woman was just Tazered for doing that:
And I agree that other phones are more popular, and are available in a wider variety of physical configurations, and at lower cost. But even if the percentage of people buying iPhones is low, the number of customers is high, so the total sales are high, even when you only count the iPhones sold through official channels. When you add in the high unit prices, you get Apple's reported revenue numbers.
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In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M.
The smartphone market reached a significant milestone, a breakthrough that may cause vendors to celebrate but could strain the capabilities of IT service desks.
In the fall of 2011, around 160,000 students in 190 countries enrolled in a Stanford-sponsored online course about artificial intelligence. About 23,000 completed the course and got certificates, including 248 who got a perfect score. The university offered the same course the old-fashioned way to students sitting in Stanford classrooms. None of the those students got a perfect score.
As Mitch Wagner discussed today, Yahoo is acquiring Tumblr. The big Internet debate at the moment is whether Tumblr will be good or bad for Yahoo. Regardless of their stances on the future of Yahoo itself, many claim that Yahoo will somehow ruin Tumblr.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
Ushering in a new era of cognitive computing systems, IBM announced today the IBM Watson Engagement Advisor, a technology breakthrough that allows brands to crunch big data in record time to transform the way they engage clients in key functions such as customer service, marketing, and sales.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
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M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
