Apple launches trade-in program in China to get Android users to upgrade to iPhones

“Apple is having a rough quarter selling iPhones to Chinese consumers, according to CEO Tim Cook’s letter to investors on Wednesday,” Krystal Hu reports for Yahoo Finance. “Cook blamed the macroeconomy and U.S.-China trade tensions, but said the company won’t ‘sit around waiting for the macro to change’ in an interview with CNBC.”
“The iPhone maker has come up with what it hopes to be a solution to tepid sales in its second-largest market: get people to trade in their Android phones for credit to help them buy a newly-released iPhone,” Hu reports. “To boost iPhone sales, Apple launched a ‘GiveBack’ trade-in promotion offer for its new iPhone XS and iPhone XR devices in the U.S. in November. In late December, the promotional program for the new models went live in China, adding one major perk: users in China can not only trade in their old iPhones, but also Android phones made by Apple’s major competitors in China, including Huawei, OPPO and Xiaomi.”
“Consumers can trade in a Huawei’s flagship phone Mate 9 PRO with 128 GB storage, for example, for a 720 yuan ($104) credit that they can use on iPhone XS and XR purchases,” Hu reports. “But the trade-in value for Android Phones seems to be much lower than old iPhone devices.”
MacDailyNews Take: This is, of course, because Android phones are dog-slow, insecure, iPhone knockoffs with no meaningful resale value, so Apple’s going to strip them down for recycling and disposal.
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: It’s going to take much more than this, but a start is a start.
One thing’s true the world over: If it’s not an iPhone, it’s not an iPhone.