Chinese to wait patiently for new iPhone

Latest version of Apple phone to go on sale mid-Sep in several markets first but not China

One day after US-based Apple Inc unveiled the iPhone 6, a watch, and a mobile payment service on Tuesday (US time), Chinese netizens reacted with patience to the disappointing news that the Chinese mainland is not included among the initial launch markets.

The new iPhones will first go on sale on September 19 in several markets including the US, Germany, Singapore as well as Hong Kong, but not the Chinese mainland.

The Apple Watch will be available on the market in early 2015, the company said at the launch Tuesday.

The iPhone 6 launch plan differs with that for the iPhone 5s/5c and iPad Air, for which the Chinese mainland was among the initial launch markets.

"China is a key market for us and we will get there as soon as possible," Apple said in a statement e-mailed to the Global Times on Wednesday.

The reaction of many Chinese netizens was mostly calm.

A survey conducted by news portal sina.com.cn, in which 27,030 people had participated in as of 11 pm on Wednesday, indicated that around 20 percent of those surveyed chose a "wait-and-see" stance for the newly revealed Apple Watch and the two variants of the iPhone 6.

For the Apple Watch, 57.9 percent surveyed said they will not buy it while 19.9 percent said yes. Another 22.2 percent said they will wait a period of time before buying it.

For the iPhone 6, which comes in two screen sizes, 47.5 percent surveyed said they will not buy them while 31.8 percent said they will buy.

"Besides the iPhone 6's enlarged size and empowered processors, I don't see a significant difference from its predecessors," Zhao Zijian, a college teacher living in Beijing, told the Global Times on Wednesday.

"Perhaps all those leaks raised my expectation," Zhao said, referring to photos of frameless new iPhones and fancy-shaped watches that had been circulating among the Chinese online community in recent months.

Some media reports say the new Apple Pay payment service function that comes with the new iPhones might have the potential to change the mobile payment business.

Wang Weidong, an analyst at iResearch Consulting Group, said that new iPhones that come with near field communication (NFC) function and Apple's payments service could replace credit cards and debit cards in their physical forms.

The NFC technology lets smartphones communicate wirelessly with devices such as point-of-sale terminals by simply tapping them together.

"But it won't challenge the existence of credit card giants such as Visa, MasterCard, and China's UnionPay payment system," Wang told the Global Times on Wednesday, noting that if Apple wants its Apple Pay service to be usable in China, it probably needs to strike an agreement with UnionPay.

Some people suspect Apple is exploring ways of entering the emerging Internet finance industry with its new payment service, but Wang disagreed.

"It is not that Apple intentionally plans to wade into the Internet finance sector. It is just that the company has invented a new way to cash in on a chain of assets it already owned," Wang said, referring to Apple's customer database, terminals, and customer loyalty.

However, analysts warned that Apple should beef up its security for its iCloud cloud storage and computing service, after a recent leakage of private photos of a number of Hollywood stars in the US.

To industry insiders, the unveiling of Apple Watch is a valuable addition to the fledging market of wearable devices.

A number of companies such as Lenovo, Huawei, ZTE, TCL, Xiaomi and Samsung have already rolled out their wearable products, which range from a simple wristband to more sophisticated watches.

"The Apple Watch could be a milestone product. Its arrival could really usher in a great era of growth for the smart watch industry," China Wearable Computing Promotion Alliance told the Global Times in an e-mailed statement on Wednesday.

There are currently over 80 smart watch products that allow wearers to make phone calls and utilize the GPS function, but the absence of a killer product and a dominant brand is noticeable, the alliance said.

According to data from US-based website businessinsider.com, the market value of wearables could hit $5.17 billion by 2015.