TechInAsia reports that Chinese buyers are buying from China Unicom rather than Apple as the carrier offers both iPhone 5c and 5s with no up-front cost.
The catch? Monthly costs higher than in the USA, and contracts that run for either 30 or 36 months. Those monthly costs are massive in a country where the average monthly salary is around $800, and a 36-month contract means that buying an iPhone 5c or 5s today will see you sitting out the iPhone 6 and 6s/c/whoknowswhat.
It’s estimated that China already had 42M iPhone users before the launch of the new phones, and before they were officially supported by any of the local carriers.
Full comparison of U.S. and China Unicom costs below …
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Romania: 269 euro for the 16 gb iPhone5 (not S not C) model with a 55euro/month for a 24 months Orange contract. Sorry but both us and china seem much more reasonable.
Slovenia: 1€ for the iPhone 5 16GB with a 50€/month contract for 24 months and you get unlimited calls, unlimited messages and 5,5GB data. =)