Apple launched its online retail store in China this week — and promptly sold out of iPhone 4 units within 10 hours, forcing the company to suspend sales.
With Apple’s recent move to stop iPhone sales in its brick-&-mortar stores in China, this means there’s now nowhere to purchase an iPhone in the country — except from the scalpers who are scooping-up all stocks in the first place.
Beijing currently has two Apple retail stores where staff confirmed the situation.
“All mobile phones are now sold through the online store and customers must pay the money after the order is made, then the company will distribute it to the designated place for free,” they told People’s Daily.
China Unicom says the situation vis-a-vis availability will improve after November.
The report also claims the CDMA iPhone should debut on China Telecom next year, though this hasn’t been confirmed.
MIC Gadget (Via MacRumors) adds,
As far as we know, there’s a high demand for iPhone 4 in China, especially Beijing and Shanghai. The people here do not mind about the price, they just wish to buy one and tell their friends that they have got an iPhone 4. So, consumers no longer need to buy an iPhone 4 through China Unicom, the only telecom operator offering Apple’s iPhone in China, they just need to learn how to act faster than those irritating scalpers and place an order on China online Apple Store before a scalper does.
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