iPhone 4 in play ahead of opening
- Source: Global Times
- [10:21 July 09 2010]
- Comments
Apple enthusiasts from Jilin Province (above) Thursday hold up their wristbands that ensure they are the first two customers let into the store inside the International Financial Center when it opens tomorrow. Photo: Cai Xianmin
By Li Xiang
With Apple preparing for its official grand opening of its first Shanghai store tomorrow, vendors illegally selling smuggled iPhone 4 cell phones in the city say that they have no plans to reduce prices for the gadgets.
Though the iPhone 4 - that promises users a sleeker version of its predecessor, the iPhone 3GS, with a higher resolution display screen and face-to-face video calling - has yet to launch on the Chinese mainland, plenty of the phones were on shelves Thursday at Ever Bright Town, a commercial building near the Shanghai Railway Station popular for its wide range of the latest electronic prod-ucts on the market.
Vendors were willing to sell unlocked and jail broken iPhone 4s for 12,000 yuan ($1,771), while locked ones hovered around 7,500 yuan ($1,107).
Although several vendors told the Global Times Thursday that sales of the iPhone 4, which officially hit the US, British, French, German and Japanese markets in late June, have been lower than expected, they said they would not sell for less, despite the fact that Apple will open its new Shanghai store on the weekend.
"We will wait and see what happens," a vendor surnamed Jiang, who owns a shop selling cell phones on the first floor of Ever Bright, told the Global Times Thursday. "The iPhone 4 is rumored to launch in Hong Kong sometime in August, so we're not sure how that will affect the market on the mainland."
With China Mobile currently in negotiations with Apple over the launch of the iPhone 4 on the Chinese mainland, vendors say that time is still on their side.
"The truth of the matter remains that even if the iPhone 4 were to launch soon in China, the phones that we sell compared to ones that would sell at the Apple store in Shanghai would be catering to very different clientele," another vendor surnamed Chen told the Global Times Thursday. "Therefore, we probably won't lower our prices otherwise it would be too difficult for us to profit on our sales of the product."
She added that strong sales of the iPhone 3GS since it officially landed on the Chinese mainland market at the end of last year, further bolsters confidence for the iPhone 4.
Apple representatives in Shanghai at the store inside the International Financial Center would not take interviews from this Global Times reporter Thursday, and several calls later went unanswered by Apple China in Beijing, where the company has its first, and until tomorrow, the only store on the mainland. The Global Times, however, did receive a late e-mail from Huang Yuna, director of public relations of Apple China, who said that the company was preoccupied with preparations for its Shanghai store opening, and that she was unable to comment on the situation.
"I will talk with you once information (on the issue) is available," she wrote.
But a senior employee from the Apple headquarters in California Thursday told the Global Times that the promise of huge profit margins with little risk for real penalty is fueling the problem.
"No-contract iPhone 3GS start from $599 (4,059 yuan)," said the man who asked to remain anonymous. "When these can be sold in China for at least twice that amount, it's no wonder many smugglers opt to get involved in this kind of business."
He declined to comment on how Apple plans to counteract the smuggling of their products into China, saying that he had to mind business confidentiality agreements.
According to a Chinese student surnamed Hu, who studies at an Ivy League school in New York, said that he has been able to make a considerable profit by sending iPhones purchased in the US back to vendors in China.
While customs officials have kept their eye out for smuggled iPhone 4s since its release, with authorities in Bei-jing detaining a batch of unlocked versions of the phone coming in from the UK at the end of June, the reality is that these products are commonly snuck through all the time, according to an official surnamed Li at the General Administration of Customs.
"The shuihuo, or smuggled goods, especially cell phones, come mostly from Hong Kong, and rarely get confiscated by customs if the amount is small," he told the Global Times Thursday. "That having been said, we do fine transport-ers or recipients if they are caught."
