Buyers of Apple’s new iPhone 15 Pro Max in China will need to wait for four to five weeks before receiving the smartphone, the company’s website showed on Friday as it started taking pre-orders in an early sign of strong demand.
The wait is slightly shorter for iPhone 15 Pro at two to three weeks, while the company said it could deliver iPhone 15 by Sept. 22, the day the phone goes on sale in stores.
For the iPhone 15 Plus, the wait in China is eight working days.
These early signs are likely to ease worries of a demand hit in the third largest market for Apple amid growing competition from Huawei Technologies (HWT.UL) and Beijing’s widening curbs on iPhone use by government staff.
The Chinese foreign ministry has said the country has not banned on the purchase and use of foreign phone brands,.
The high-end iPhone models were sold out on Apple’s store on Alibaba’s Tmall marketplace within a minute of going on sale, local media report said.
On JD.com, one of Apple’s biggest sale channels in China, more than 3.4 million reservations were placed in total for the four iPhone 15 models in the run-up to the e-commerce platform opening orders on Friday evening.
“Since the decline of Huawei, the iPhone has been able to attract a massive number of consumers in the more than $600 segment,” said Ivan Lam, senior analyst at Counterpoint.
“The new iPhone 15 series, especially the Pro series, will be a good choice for the installed base who are using iPhone 11/12 and looking for an update replacement,” Lam said, while adding that Huawei’s Mate 60 series will be a challenge to the iPhone.
Huawei launched the smartphone with an advanced chip late last month and it could mark a comeback for the Chinese tech firm, which was once the world’s biggest smartphone maker before its business was decimated by U.S. export controls, analysts said.
State media reported this week that better-than-expected sales had prompted Huawei to raise its second-half shipment target for its Mate 60 series by 20% and its forecast for overall new smartphone shipments in 2023 to at least 40 million units.
Huawei’s Mate 60 launch was unusual in that Huawei did not carry out any pre-marketing or organise a glitzy event. The company is set to hold an event on Sept. 25, where it is expected to discuss its new smartphone.
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