Cloned In China

Every life on the earth knows China Unicom’s iPhone doesn’t sell well. Even the homeless dogs on street know that too, because it couldn’t be more easier for them to see ironic smiles on people who are looking at China Unicom’s iPhone advertisement posters along the streets. Definitely and obviously the missing Wi-Fi and the price are the only two reasons.

China Unicom’s CEO Chang Xiaobing is one among the 2300 delegates of China’s ongoing annual ‘Liang hui’ conferences. On the break of the conferences, he answered some questions related to iPhone by reporters. about the Wi-Fi, there were some reports that the Wi-Fi iPhone would arrive in China in mid or late March, or April latest. Mr. Chang said:” we’ve been in talk with Apple all the time, and Apple is working hard on the solutions, hoping to provide Wi-Fi enabled iPhone to Chinese consumers as soon as possible, but”, he added, ” There ’s still no specified timetable. ”

In order to dispel the hesitation of waiting for the Wi-Fi version iPhone from the buyers, Mr. Chang drew a delicious pie on the air for them: ” When Wi-Fi iPhone is available, We will consider to let those who has bought the Wi-Fi lacking iPhone to use Internet traffic ( through 3G) with no worry.”

The price is also a big problem. Take the 16GB iPhone 3gs for example. China Unicom sells this phone at 5,880 Yuan, while those on the black market with Wi-Fi are priced about 5000 Yuan. The price gap is about $125 USD. So, any possibility for China Unicom to pull down the price?

Mr. Chang gave no ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, just saying:” not only consumers, we also hope the price can go down, but we hope this is done by the competition from the market. it needs efforts from all of us. ” Quite obscure, right?

[source]