
Apple's iPhone Shipments Plunge in China as Huawei Tightens Grip - Leary
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-11/apple-s-iphone-shipments-plunge-in-china-as-huawei-tightens-grip
======
yonkshi
Currently visiting China for Chinese New Year, and can't help but to notice
the anti-US anti-Apple sentiment that arose recently. Although anecdotal, I
think the nationalistic sentiment has a lot to do with the dip in sales.

To put in perspective, most Chinese netizens are generally pretty critical of
the Chinese gov. Chinese with higher educations usually look up to western
culture and products. However after the Huawei arrest incident, the Chinese
netizens were _pissed_ at the American government, I've never seen such anger
towards the US gov, and huge waves of boycotts began. They think that American
gov is bullying a Chinese company into obeying US law even outside US, and
their response is to boycott American products.

During my two weeks here I've talked to a dozen random people at bars, friends
gatherings and on the plane. Normally US-China politics never come up, but it
has come up in almost every single conversation this trip. Most of these
people mention that they recent switched to a Chinese phone or their next
phone will be a domestic phone.

~~~
free652
For some reason I doubt that you have the right perspective. Chinese are very
nationalistic and every non immigrant Chinese I met is pro Chinese government.
Netcitizens are even worse.

American are persecuting a company that disobeyed American laws on American
soil. No a single Chinese would blink an eye about persecuting American
companies in China.

China is having economic issues, that's the major reason in sales' dip.

~~~
ardy42
> American are persecuting a company that disobeyed American laws on American
> soil. No a single Chinese would blink an eye about persecuting American
> companies in China.

Hypocrites exist. The Chinese government was shamelessly hypocritical over the
Meng arrest, complaining that it violated her "human rights," [1] while their
utter indifference to them has yet again been made clear by the camps in
Xinjiang. I doubt everyday nationalistic citizens would be any more
thoughtful.

[1]
[https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46465768](https://www.bbc.com/news/business-46465768):
"A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson told reporters: 'The detention
without giving any reason violates a person's human rights.' ... Beijing has
itself frequently been accused by rights groups of rights abuses including
unexplained detentions"

> China is having economic issues, that's the major reason in sales' dip.

Nationalistic ferver drummed up by the Huawei arrest could compound the sales
drop.

~~~
dethac
So... because China violates the rights of Chinese citizens, the US deserves
to violate the rights of Chinese citizens?

It goes both ways. I'm sure we'd all prefer if everyone would just stop
violating human rights, but that isn't happening. It's not fair to ignore the
US's human rights violations just because of China's, and it's not fair to
ignore China's human rights violations just because of the US's. Both
governments are hypocritical.

------
potatofarmer45
I think what a lot of commentators are missing is that even without a trade
war, IPhone shipments would have fallen in China.

In the past, the android phones kept focussing on features (remember the s3
ads about how it had all these features missing in the 4/4s). Now, especially
with Huawei, they've really mastered the art of branding and messaging on
their products. When Huawei listed a phone with 3 cameras and cost more than
an iphone, I knew that was a home run. The higher price reinforced the image
of the premiumness of Huawei which benefitted all their products down the line
as evidenced by their sales numbers. They've finally realized the Xiaomi (same
quality at a lower price), actually doesn't work on an emotional level with
consumers. Instead, Huawei have gone to the extreme (Leica partnership lenses
+ 3 cameras). They've been doing this for a while, and results just take time
to show and now they have.

~~~
JohnJamesRambo
What do the 3 cameras do?

~~~
ninedays
It doesn't really matter as long as it creates a sense of uniqueness for the
consumer. Remember all these octo-cores smartphones that were supposed to
perform way better than the two-cores smartphones? It's only there to tell you
"3 cameras are better than 2" even though no one understands what it does.
Same with cores : "wow 8 cores? 8 is such a big number compared to 2 cores
therefore it must be way better/faster"

~~~
dvfjsdhgfv
May or may not be the case.

> “When I first heard that Huawei’s new flagship device was going to have
> three rear-facing cameras I was sceptical,” said Ben Wood, chief of research
> at CCS Insight. “But it feels like the company has added meaningful features
> rather than gimmicks, including the five-times telephoto zoom, excellent low
> light, long exposure performance and crisp black and white pictures the
> dedicated monochrome lens offers.”

[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/27/huawei-p2...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/27/huawei-p20-pro-
smartphone-three-cameras-full-body-screen)

> Huawei’s traditional setup of combining the data from a monochrome and a
> color sensor is still in place, but this time, the color sensor weighs in at
> a whopping 40 megapixels. You’ll have the option to use that entire
> resolution to take photos, though the default setting will be to combine the
> data from four adjacent pixels into one and thus generate clearer, brighter
> 10-megapixel shots. One of these quad-pixel pixels inside the P20 Pro
> measures in at 2µm, which is huge for a smartphone sensor. Google’s Pixel 2,
> for comparison, has 1.4µm pixels, while the regular P20, which has a
> 12-megapixel main sensor, comes with 1.55µm pixels.

[https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/27/17165822/huawei-p20-pro-s...](https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/27/17165822/huawei-p20-pro-
specs-price-release-date)

~~~
baybal2
I have Maimang 5 - a budget phone from almost 4 years ago. Despite it
budgetness, it still came with the best camera chip on the market at the time,
and with far from budget parts, aside from SoC. And it was never advertised on
those points.

------
ksec
Roger McNamee seems to get it, the iPhone was probably the most successful
technology product in history, and arguably the "most" successful in anything.
It leads to a sea of other innovation across multiple spectrum.

On the Notes of Retail, Apple had ~430 Stores in 2014, ~460 in 2015. As of end
2018 it is ~510, all the stores opened in 2015 were planned before Angela's
arrival, so effectively she has slowed down the opening of new Apple Store
under her tenure. During that time, Apple grew from ~800M Active Devices to
1.4B, that is 600M Devices increase, but less than 60 new Stores opened, if
you are wondering why it is so crowed you cant even breath in Apple Store,
that is why.

In 2015 I made a prediction that Apple could be aiming at 1B iPhone users by
2020. It seems crazy at the time, and a lot of people did call me so. But as
of 2019 Apple has 900M iPhone users, so the 1B iPhone users doesn't seems to
far off. I also thought Apple should be aiming at 1000 Apple Stores world
wide. Apple Retail were growing at approximately 10+% before 2015, it was
possible to reach ~750 by 2020, now not only have they not accelerated, they
slowed down.

From reading all the latest Interview, it finally seems to me this luxury
Apple idea didn't came from Angela herself. It came from Tim Cook ( or may be
even Jonny Ive ), he wanted Apple to be more luxurious ( Apple Watch Gold
Edition in 2016 ), and get Angela on board to try and help shaping the Retail
part. Angela never wanted the job in the first place, but Tim Cook talked her
into it. And one reason why her salary package were the highest in Apple.

I hope having Deirdre O'Brien meant Tim Cook gave up this idea of luxurious
Apple. At least not luxurious in the normal sense, Apple is an affordable
luxury in tech world, and that is drastically different to clothing or Jewelry
industry. iPhone needs After sales services, and you cant rely on a small
number of Apple store to provide adequate services to its customers and loyal
users.

~~~
kettlecorn
Apple is not just chasing luxury, they’re chasing tech as fashion.

They realized that when people carry their tech with them all the time it
becomes fashion. That’s why they bought Beats, because it became a huge tech-
fashion brand that threatened Apple.

And with fashion people are willing to pay much higher prices.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Which was not a clever idea, because Apple already owned the tech-as-fashion
brand just by being themselves.

In fact the fashion market is all about ridiculous virtue signalling at
absolutely ridiculous prices - like the Vertu range, which takes an average
phone and wraps it in some leather and chrome bling, dresses up the marketing
copy with "craftsmanship" "exclusive" etc etc etc and charges five figures for
it.

The key point is _ridiculous_ pricing. Not just the very high end of
affordable, like Apple. But the kind of ridiculous that only works for the
0.1%.

So Apple was never going to be Gucci-of-tech, or LV, or H. Or even Vertu.
Because Apple is never going to charge $20k for its main iPhone range. And
unless it does, it can't be a serious fashion brand.

In fact Apple's strong point was always its appeal to the exclusivity of the
_creative_ market - talent, intelligence, inventiveness, and art. It's a
completely different exclusivity - more accessible but also sexier - than the
mass market appeal of the expensive-but-trying-too-hard mid-market brands that
Apple has ended up in.

Cook has done an excellent job of destroying that creative entrepreneurial
foundation. This has made a lot of money for Apple in the medium term, but at
the cost of the good will and loyalty of its core fans.

That won't seem like a problem if you're a bean counter, but it's a huge
vulnerability for the brand. It means Apple has shaved off more and more of
its USP, and now it's vulnerable to imitators in some of its key territories.

------
ancorevard
China's economy is looking scary at this point.

Also from Bloomberg: Chinese consumer tax receipts down 70% in November.
[https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-12-31/china-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-12-31/china-
s-economic-slowdown-is-worsening-stop-dithering-beijing)

~~~
adventured
The corporate bond defaults [1] are also interesting as a tell on their real
situation. I'll be curious to see if the central government relents and
unleashes a far larger stimulus as it appears there isn't going to be a trade
deal near-term.

Granted, you've also got Germany in a de facto recession and the UK inching
toward one [2]. If the US can maintain a 2.5%+ GDP growth pace for 2019
against all of that, it'll be surprising. Projections on S&P 500 Q1 earnings
have turned from 6-7% growth to an expected contraction. The market will
weaken further with earnings growth disappearing, which is guaranteed to force
the Fed to pause rate hikes and then cut.

[1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-11/two-
large...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-11/two-large-
chinese-borrowers-are-said-to-miss-bond-payments)

[2] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-11/u-k-
econo...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-11/u-k-economy-
wilts-as-brexit-jitters-hit-business-investment)

~~~
paganel
> Granted, you've also got Germany in a de facto recession

Added to that, Deutsche Bank's recent "funding woes" (to quote the FT)
personally give me a bad vibe, not sure if we're at the "summer 2007 phase" of
Northern Rock's troubles [2] or if we're already in the "early September 2008
phase", i.e. a couple of weeks before Lehman fell. The nastier news is that,
afaik, Deutsche is (was?) seen as being supported by the German government
(the same as Volkswagen, for example), even more than the Wall Street
investment banks were supported by Washington, and if Deutsche falls that will
reflect very, very badly on the perceived financial soundness of the German
government and hence of Europe as a whole.

[1]
[https://www.ft.com/content/cb739552-2c5d-11e9-8744-e7016697f...](https://www.ft.com/content/cb739552-2c5d-11e9-8744-e7016697f225)

[2]
[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6996136.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6996136.stm)

------
robk
If you look at market share though it seems to actually be holding solid or
growing [1]. This makes me believe a more neutral narrative that it's due to
people upgrading from lousy low end android to higher end android much faster
than an existing iPhone user would upgrade. The top 25% of the population use
iPhones and aren't leaving the Apple platform - the folks who bought a low end
phone are upgrading to higher end much more rapidly. [1]
[https://www.statista.com/statistics/262176/market-share-
held...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/262176/market-share-held-by-
mobile-operating-systems-in-china/)

~~~
oblio
It's Windows vs Mac all over again, people just wouldn't believe it :)

1 company vs 100. All the 100 companies would have to be knuckleheads forever
(which is super unlikely, it's basically: "you can fool some people all the
time or all the people sometimes, but you can't really fool all the people all
the time").

Android is moving up in the world, and except for the US, which was always a
bit weird in regards to Apple, Android will make Windows' dominance look like
a walk in the park. Look at what Google's doing with relatively weaker
dominance of Chrome in the web browser world.

~~~
scarface74
Windows vs Mac is a very shallow interpretation.

-the affluence level of iOS users dwarf Android users statistically. A person who can afford a $700 iPhone is much more valuable than a person buying a $220 Android phone (the average selling price of an Android phone)

\- Apple couldn’t keep up performance wise with the Mac because you had the
entire PC industry funding Intel. Hardly anyone is making money selling
Android phones. Apple is making 80% of the profit in the phone market.

-iOS is doing well in most affluent countries

[https://deviceatlas.com/blog/android-v-ios-market-
share](https://deviceatlas.com/blog/android-v-ios-market-share)

~~~
oblio
My personal opinion is that the future of technology isn't in the current
affluent countries. Besides this, we already know that the vast majority of
people stay within their ecosystems, once they start using them. Especially
know that the differences in phone quality are going down (cheap phones are
getting good; a cheap Android phone from 2010 was miles away from an iPhone, a
cheap Android phone from 2020 will be comparatively much, much closer).

So the future isn't looking very bright for Apple, considering that India,
China and Africa are almost entirely Android territories :)

Just keep in mind that Windows failed for 10+ years before having the smash
hit that was Windows 95.

~~~
scarface74
Windows “failed” but the whole time Microsoft was making a killing selling
DOS. Microsoft, Intel, and the PC manufactures were all making money. The PC
market drove a demand for high performing chips and even when PCs were being
commoditized, there was enough of a demand for high end processors to keep
Intel’s R&D effort strong. The high end profitable niche of the Android market
is teeny. It’s eveb worse in the tablet market and the wearable market.

Not even Google is making any real money on Android. It came out during the
Oracle trial that Android has only made Google $39 billion during its entire
existence. Even then, they pay Apple over $2 billion a year to be the default
search engine for iOS devices. Mobile hasn’t been that great for anyone in the
Android ecosystem.

Android as a whole is nothing more than unprofitable race to the bottom.

What use it to sell to 3 billion people buying $50 phones? If Apple starts
losing the high end, then it needs to worry.

Even in the PC market, none of the PC manufacturers are rolling in cash -
except for Apple. I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple makes more selling Macs
than all PC manufacturers make selling computers (excluding servers).

On a second thought, the biggest users of servers are probably cloud companies
and Facebook and many of them are making their own servers.

~~~
orangecat
_It came out during the Oracle trial that Android has only made Google $39
billion during its entire existence. Even then, they pay Apple over $2 billion
a year to be the default search engine for iOS devices._

If Android didn't exist, Google would likely be paying even more to be the
default search engine on non-iOS devices, or they'd have significantly lower
search revenue.

------
puranjay
Now that China profits have dried up, Apple will turn its attention to India.

But they've really missed a trick with their retail strategy in India. They've
partnered with local retailers to run "Apple stores". These stores are nowhere
near the smooth, beautiful experience of a regular Apple Store.

It feels preposterous to walk into a shoddily built store selling a phone for
$1200 when you can walk next door to a Samsung or OnePlus outlet and get a
similarly capable phone for half the price

Apple needs to bump up its quality game. They've been losing market share here
in India and for all purposes, this country is a lost cause to them. I
wouldn't be a very happy Apple shareholder right now

~~~
hajile
I somewhat doubt India is a good target for them. Even FirefoxOS feature
phones currently outsell Apple in India right now.

~~~
puranjay
India's premium smartphone market is small, of course, but it is also growing,
and it is also a market where Apple has lost massive market share.

And let's be honest, anyone who can see even 10 years into the future would
know that the next wave of growth will come from India

------
GeekyBear
It seems peculiar for stories to continue to ignore the economic situation
inside China as a major cause for Apple's sales woes inside China, especially
given the number of companies not named Apple that have also reported plunging
sales there.

We've had reports of a worsening job market and reduced consumer spending
inside China since last year.

>DONGGUAN, China — China’s consumers and businesses are losing confidence. Car
sales have plunged. The housing market is stumbling. Some factories are
letting workers off for the big Lunar New Year holiday two months early.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/business/china-economy-
xi...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/14/business/china-economy-xi-
jinping.html)

~~~
dmix
The first bullet in their _sub-headline_ does say:

> IPhone’s high price tag is a major reason for the contraction

That combined with lower consumer confidence could easily be the most obvious
reason. With a small amount of nationalistic propaganda/marketing thrown in.

The other big elephant in the room is WeChat becoming the primary Chinese
mobile OS, diminishing the value of Android vs iOS. Which puts further
pressure on the price of the phones, as they are more commodity-like. Apple
raising prices, particularly in China, at this time might end up being the
worst business idea they've made in a long time.

~~~
GeekyBear
If Bloomberg's theory were true and the price of Apple's devices was the major
issue here (and not the Chinese economy) then we would expect to see similar
sales drops outside of China, and we have not.

Also, we wouldn't expect to see falling sales in China across all of the
device manufacturers (even those selling budget devices) inside China as shown
in even this article.

The reality is that the major factor here is that Chinese consumers are
cutting way back on spending due to economic uncertainty inside China.

It's something that has been discussed in the media since last year.

------
nakodari
iPhones have become just too expensive for people in Asia to buy. It's simple
as that. If they bring down the price to $599 like it was for the original
iPhone and keep the price constant every year, Apple will double or even
triple their existing market share. It will still be profitable for Apple
knowing that service revenue will increase when more people are using iPhones
around the world.

~~~
baybal2
No, the simple explanation for their sales tanking is simply because they got
their market saturated. Plainly and simple.

Huawei on other hand has rather different marketing plan - they make somewhat
expensive products for ordinary people, even thought some of their phones can
cost more than $1000 USD in maxed out configuration (leather and hand made
editions)

Apple on another hand has really little appeal to this demographic, on both
brand identity front, and product match.

That surely sounds unusual to a Western person, but that how it is. Huawei
buyer is a well off working man in late twenties or early thirties with few
more things to care about in his life than his phone.

Car analogy: Huawei - a nice full size sedan, a show of success for a common
man; Apple - an "economy supercar" like Black Badge edition RR Ghost,
something what broke millionaire wannabees buy

~~~
Synaesthesia
Within China, Apple doesn't compete on price. Yes Huawei has expensive phones,
but for example you can buy a Mate 20 Pro for $650 there whereas an iPhone XS
costs $1,270 for the entry level model.

[https://www.gizmochina.com/2018/10/26/huawei-mate-20-and-
mat...](https://www.gizmochina.com/2018/10/26/huawei-mate-20-and-mate-20-pro-
chinese-pricing-vs-other-regions/)

~~~
baybal2
> iPhone XS costs $1,270 for the entry level model.

Indeed, but they also have the "3rd world iPhone" models - respins of previous
generations and "C" model which were to supposedly cater to this market.

They greatly overestimated willingness of locals into buying "poor man's Rolce
Royce editions"

~~~
pjmlp
Who would buy a previous generation iPhone when they can buy a modern Android
generation phone for the half the price?

~~~
scarface74
A “modern generation” Android phone that is half the price of an iPhone would
be much slower. The 6s from 2015 was faster than the flagship Galaxy S8 in
single core performance.

Also, that Android phone you buy will stop getting updates in 18 months if
you’re lucky. The iPhone 5s from 2013 is still running the latest OS.

~~~
rchaud
> A “modern generation” Android phone that is half the price of an iPhone
> would be much slower.

Slower in doing what? Posting a pic/video on Wechat? Making a money transfer?
Playing a game?

Phones today are where the PC market was about a decade ago when 4GB RAM and a
Core 2 Duo SoCs became common and offered enough performance for users to not
have to upgrade their laptop every 3-5 years.

We don't have to look at AnandTech-style benchmark analysis anymore to figure
out whether a midrange Android in 2019 will serve most needs.

~~~
scarface74
I just had the pleasure of using my son’s Moto G released in 2018. He was glad
to upgrade to my old iPhone 6s.

------
cm2187
I’d expect the same to happen in a recession in the western world. People do
not buy luxury products in a recession and if they absolutely need to replace
a device, will pick one half the price that’s good enough.

Though the business model of tech giant is new, for most, the market in which
they evolve isn’t. Facebook and Google’s revenues are essentially advertising,
another source of revenues that is very pro-cyclical.

Amazon is retail sales, also quite pro-cyclical.

I don’t know how a cloud business would behave in a recession. Plus the cloud
is still in high growth phase, kind of like smartphones or online advertising
were in 2008, making the economic context less relevant.

~~~
alkonaut
Manufacturers will ensure phone companies ensure customers buy new phones.

In the odd event that my iPhone lasts the 24months without having a major
hardware hickup (such as being shattered), somehow all the rebates disappear
from my plan. A rep from my phone company calls me and says I can get a new 24
months plan WITH a new iphone, and since the new one would get the rebates I
just lost, it's effectively the same monthly cost including the new phone.
Being the sucker that I am, I accept and I have a new phone.

I'm sure I could find a company that sells me a plan that would become
_cheaper_ instead of stripped of all rebates once my 24 months are over. But
I'm also lazy and don't want to switch mobile networks as my current network
has the best coverage in the rural areas I need to go to.

It's a plan plan that is both simple and clever: instead of lowering the
prices for buying new phones, what they do is just raise the price of NOT
buying a new phone.

~~~
pjmlp
That only works in countries that are contract driven, in those where pre-pay
rules, not so much.

------
andy_ppp
Doesn't help that even I can't keep track of the differences between their
phones and which lower end models they still sell and what the hell the iPhone
XR is meant to be.

Feels like Apple have a really weird phone line up right now.

There used to be 3 models - iPhone classic (the previous gen maybe with a few
tweaks), iPhone massive (better camera and battery) and iPhone awesome
expensive high tech edition (new stuff). Now it seems to be 5 or more models
in China, how can this make sense? Just stick to those three models and price
them correctly and they'll get more sales.

~~~
close04
> Doesn't help that even I can't keep track of the differences between their
> phones and which lower end models they still sell and what the hell the
> iPhone XR is meant to be.

> Feels like Apple have a really weird phone line up right now.

So Apple's sales are hurt because it's hard to keep track of their 3 models
this year? Shouldn't the same logic basically kill Huawei's sales?

Off the top of your head can you quickly tell me the differences between these
Huawei models launched over the past year?

 _Huawei Mate 20 Pro, Huawei Mate 20 Lite, Huawei Mate 20, Huawei P20 Pro,
Huawei P20, Huawei Mate 10 Pro._

And that's only counting the high-ish end. It would be a really long comment
if I included all models.

~~~
andy_ppp
Huawei isn't a premium brand in the same way Apple is so keeping things clear
and focused is less important for them. I think we all know many of the
reasons discussed on here has contriibuted to the downturn in sales. I'm
clearly not saying it's exclusively about one issue in my comment, but you
decided to rephrase it to say that, which must have been fun for you.

Edit: Changed "X" to be "one issue" for clairty, but thay makes the following
comment confusing. Sorry about that.

~~~
close04
I said nothing about the X nor have I implied it, just about Apple’s lineup in
general. Apple has a very narrow lineup that’s not that hard to follow. Huawei
aims at high end and the prices confirm it. The lineup is far more
complicated. And being less than high end shouldn’t really change this. If a
complicated lineup kills sales it should do it for both Apple and Huawei.

My only point is that the argument “lineup is complicated” doesn’t really have
any merit. I see no point in attcking me for something that left very little
room for interpretation.

------
hevi_jos
It is obvious. China debt bubble is bursting right now so they are sensible
with prices and Apple just have raised them absurdly.

China will experience a traumatic experience(growing pains) for getting to a
service economy like the rest of the world had.

If Apple continue raising prices they will lose the mass production advantage
they have. Steve Jobs always created products that were affordable(like the
iPod, or the inexpensive macbook) so it gave the expensive ones mass
production components(like accelerometers, cameras, special glass, wifi chips,
touch screens).

It seems Tim Cook had the brilliant idea of eliminating low cost products in
order to raise margins(that are obscene high right now at Apple), but people
are not stupid and alternatives exist.

~~~
tivert
> Steve Jobs always created products that were affordable....It seems Tim Cook
> had the brilliant idea of eliminating low cost products in order to raise
> margins...

One of the smart things about Jobs's product structure is that it put people
on a position to take a chance on Apple by buying a low-end product, then they
could migrate into the more expensive end once they got used to Apple. There's
a reason it's called the _entry_ -level, and getting rid of it is foolish.

------
eastendguy
Next headlines:

2020: European Car Shipments Plunge in China as XXX(#) Tightens Grip

2025: Tesla Car Shipments Plunge in China as YYY(#) Tightens Grip

(#) Any local company currently in favor with the ruling party.

~~~
Krasnol
[https://www.volkswagenag.com/de/news/2019/01/VW_China_delive...](https://www.volkswagenag.com/de/news/2019/01/VW_China_deliveries_2018.html)

------
ohiovr
The original iPhone cost $499 according to google search.

~~~
robin_reala
…with a contract in the US.

~~~
ohiovr
People wouldn’t spring for the same exact deal at that price? Seems a lot of
people are fine with throwing 70 dollars a month just on the service even with
tons of alternatives that are a fraction of the cost.

------
JackPoach
Trade wars are a bitch

------
mtw
I am neither Chinese or American - The US targeting Huawei seems unfair. It is
like suspecting a person of theft and then applying all sorts of punishments,
without any strong proof. This is not justice. If I were Chinese, you bet I
won't buy any American product.

------
baybal2
People in the West don't get a lot about Chinese society, nor do ones who come
and go to China on few year long stays in better parts of China.

Yes, China has fake Prada, tons of fake Prada, but you don't really get a lot
of people going for Pradas invariably of its genuineness. Same for iPhone
users - there are extreme cases of idiots selling their organs to buy one, but
to most people - the brand may be near invisible, moreover to people outside
of megacities.

China's rich don't necessarily come from big cities. There are way more
millionaires outside the Beijing/Shanghai/Guangzhou trio than inside. In fact,
mid-tier cities have more millionaires per capita than megacities.

It's only natural that marketing of big foreign brands that primarily target
megacities gets what is sows - a very proletarian, working class demographic.

I want to add that Amazon got a hunch of that recently - Amazon China was a
joke up until their last few campaigns that were targeting almost exclusively
second tier cities. To everybody's surprise, that move made them to near
double their business here in around one year.

