Analyst reckons Apple will make cheap iPhones in 2014
According to an analyst, Apple will be making cheap iPhones in 2014. The question is, will this happen?
The Business Insider reports that analyst Gene Munster reckons Apple will be making a cheap version of the highly popular iPhone sometime in the next two years. He believes that the bargain iPhone will only cost $200 (around £125). He says that the budget iPhone will be for emerging markets such as China and India.
Munster says that the business model for smartphones wherein networks subsidise handsets is not applicable in emerging markets. However, with a potential 3 billion customers in these countries, Apple is willing to make changes.
In China, two of the top network operators have announced that they will be offering the iPhone 5 in the near future. However, the biggest network in China, China Mobile, still refuses to offer the handset. This means that Apple will never be able to take advantage of the network’s 700 million subscribers.
It’s a fact that Android-powered handsets dominate the Chinese market. In China, it’s not only the budget Android phones that sell like hotcakes but the high-end blowers as well. In Q3 2012, 59% of high-end smartphones sold in China were powered by Android. In that same period, 3.5 million Android handsets were sold, as opposed to only 2.3 million iPhones.
So will Apple make a cheaper iPhone? Apple recently released the iPad mini, which is a cheaper version of the new iPad. It seems Tim Cook will decide to do the same with the iPhone.
The iPad mini was set to challenge the highly successful Google Nexus 7, a dirt cheap Android tablet. So it’s possible Apple is planning to create a cheaper iPhone to rival the bargain Google Nexus 4 or its successor in 2014.
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