Apple is really trying to shake their global money tree by attempting to take 20-30% of China Mobile's iPhone service charge revenue. It makes you wonder how much their taking from the likes of AT&T by giving them exclusive US rights, thereby giving AT&T free reign to force two year contracts onto unfortunate users. Then again, AT&T was probably forced to push two year contracts in order to recoup the losses suffered from giving away a portion of their revenue to Apple. Apple in turn is forced to take a chunk from mobile service providers to make up for the iPhone's high manufacturing cost.A vicious cycle where the consumer ends up footing all the cost. At least both distributors are up front about it. It'll be interesting to see how Apple alters its strategy to lock up different international mobile providers. Who will they choose for Hong Kong? Will they even take a shot at HK since unlocked iPhones are so easily accessible?
4 comments:
Personally I would just keep my current phone and go buy an iTouch.
Laughing Man, Orange is selling iPhones in France. The interesting thing is last time I heard, they sell a locked version tied to an Orange contract for like 399 EU, but an unlocked version (mandated by French laws) at a much higher price (749 EU or something like that).
HK poses a tough business case if it follows a similar 2-tier pricing. I heard street vendors are already selling unlocked iPhones at a certain price, and any official carrier deal would have to match a similar price (although you can argue phones bought from street vendors might have problems doing software upgrades and hence customers might pay extra for officially unlocked ones).
This is messy messy. From a user experience standpoint, the iTouch and iPhone are ultimately different because you won't be near a WiFi hotspot all the time when you're on the go but want to browser the web for some info. The iPhone and iTouch's web browsing experiences are unmatched by other handset makers right now.
Upgrading software shouldn't be difficult. The shop that sold you the unlocked iPhone can likely take care of the upgrades for a small fee. Satisfaction is of course not always the promise though.
I don't think two tier pricing is absolutely necessary. Apple can't win from pricing down their phones. Perhaps just try have the providers give an attractive plan to start out with like unlimited web browsing, etc. Make it the provider's burden to make sales.
I think Apple could have done a better job with the iPod Touch. It could have been an awesome PDA! Emailing offline used to be very common with traditional PDAs. Why couldn't the Touch have email? The Touch shouldn't just be for web browsing. More on this in a future entry.
OK, just found out Steve Jobs announced last week that the Touch will upgraded with email and other apps this month.
This will certainly increase the value of the Touch. I being new to next gen iPods/iPhone, will have to see what Apple email apps are all about.
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