In China, Apple has slashed prices for its iPhone 15 series to unprecedented levels, offering discounts of up to 20% on its flagship product as competition in the world’s largest smartphone market intensifies.
Online retailer Alibaba’s Tmall initiated deeper discounts on iPhone 15 models starting Monday with the top-tier 256GB iPhone 15 Pro Max now priced at 7,949 yuan ($1,100), marking a reduction of 2,050 yuan from its previous price.
The entry-level 128GB iPhone 15 model was previously priced at 5,999 yuan but it is now 23% less expensive at 4,599 yuan. The two sites state that the sale will be open from May 20 until May 28.
In the meantime, the prices of the latest iPhone 15 models have remained the same on Apple’s mainland online store. Inquiries about this topic submitted on Monday have not received a response from the corporation yet.
The aggressive pricing that can be found on these large e-commerce sites highlights Apple’s efforts to increase domestic demand for its flagship product. This campaign follows an 8% decline in iPhone sales to $16.4 billion in the Greater China region during the March quarter.
Apple’s iPhone market share in mainland China also experienced a decline to 15.7% in the March quarter down from 20.2% a year earlier, facing fierce competition from domestic smartphone brands like Vivo, Honor, and Huawei.
Nevertheless, these recent iPhone discount campaigns appear to have yielded positive results for Apple. Shipments of foreign-branded smartphones in March surged by 12% compared to the same period last year as indicated by data released earlier this month by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.
