Apple And China Mobile Carriers Still Negotiating
March 5, 2009
The on-again, off-again talks between Apple and both of China's largest mobile phone carriers are on once again.
Earlier this month, it was rumored that Apple had again begun talks with China Unicom and possibly struck a deal to bring the iPhone 3G to China by the end of May. It seems like only part of that was true, and now China Mobile wants back in on the action.
The chairman of China Unicom, Chang Xiaobing, has told reporters that they are currently in talks with Apple:
"We are in talks with many handset suppliers, including Apple," he said.Not to be outdone, China Mobile chairman Wang Jianzhou also said his company is continuing talks with Apple, but he would not comment on the discussions between China Unicom and Apple. Analysts have spoken to Reuters stating that they believe the iPhone won't be a strong earnings catalyst for a China mobile carrier because there are so many iPhone knockoffs already available. China Unicom would allegedly give Apple a large portion of its revenue from the device and would probably have to heavily subsidize it. They went on to say that Apple doesn't have the same brand recognition in China as it does in other countries. According to these analysts, Apple is basically the only one with something to gain and that's why these negotiations keep dragging on. Hopefully the negotiations come to a positive conclusion soon so China can finally get its iPhone and we won't have to keep listening to analyst's predictions anymore. The only way to put all of these questions to rest is for Apple to get the iPhone in China and simply watch the numbers. The numbers always speak for themselves.