China Mobile receives preorders for 33,000 Apple iPhone 6 units

Even though the Apple iPhone 6won't be unveiled until September 9th, China Mobile has already started accepting preorders for both a 4.7 inch and a 5.5 inch variant of the handset. This would seem to confirm that the 5.5 inch iPhone phablet exists. The world's largest carrier restricted preorders to its online store accessible in Beijing. Since accepting these preorders, China Mobile has rung up more than 33,000 reservations. A person familiar with the timing of the launch, said that the next-gen iPhone would be released in the middle of this month.

On Taobao, which is described as the largest e-commerce platform in China, several online stores that will be receiving the phone, are requesting that customers put down $810 USD to reserve the model. One electronics seller on the platform said that many are asking about the phone, but few are actually laying out money to reserve it. He said that since July, he has had 16 orders. But this is something that has been seen throughout the country, now that Apple is making its products available in China closer to the initial launch date. The top Taobao stores have written up about 200 preorders each for the iPhone 6. When the Apple iPhone 5 was due out, these stores were able to pick up as many as 700 preorders each.

Apple is facing stiff competition in China from Meizu and Xiaomi. In fact, earlier today the Meizu MX4 was introduced in China, sporting an octa-core MediaTek chip. Priced at $293 for the 16GB version, this is a good example of what Apple is up against in China. For the second quarter, Apple had the sixth highest smartphone market share in the country.

source: ChinaDaily via AppleInsider