Apple Inc, aiming to more than double its stores in China, is advertising openings for retail workers in five cities where it currently does not have any shops.
The Cupertino, California-based company is recruiting store workers in Guangzhou, Shenyang, Tianjin, Nanjing and Dalian, advertisements posted on the company’s Web site on Thursday showed. Apple spokeswoman Amy Bessette declined to comment beyond saying: “We haven’t announced stores in those areas.”
The push is part of Apple’s efforts to move beyond Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai, where the company already has the bulk of its China stores. CEO Tim Cook has said he expects China will eventually overtake the US to become its largest market. The company doubled iPhone unit sales in China in the final three months of last year.
Photo: Reuters
“The rising importance of the China market has forced Apple to accelerate its localization,” said Nicole Peng (彭路平), Shanghai-based analyst with researcher Canalys. “In order to be able to demonstrate the overall consumer experience, services and brand image, its retail stores cannot be limited to only Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Chengdu. Many Chinese would not be able to travel to those cities.”
Apple has said it plans to open 25 more stores in China by the middle of next year, including five before next month’s Lunar New Year holiday. Apple ended last year with 15 stores in China and Hong Kong, according to its Web site.
“When I look at China, I see an enormous market where there are more people graduating into the middle class than any nation on Earth in history, and just an incredible market where people want the latest technology and products that we’re providing,” Cook told analysts during an October last year conference call. “And so we’re investing like crazy in the market.”
Two new stores have since opened in Zhengzhou and Hangzhou, and a second Chongqing location is set to open today. Apple began looking for store managers for Tianjin and Shenyang in June last year.
Apple opened its first mainland China store in Beijing’s Sanlitun area in 2008 and added others in Shanghai, Chengdu, Chongqing, Wuxi, Shenzhen, Zhengzhou and Hangzhou. It also has three stores in Hong Kong, according to its Web site.
Apple struck a deal in 2013 to sell the iPhone through China Mobile Ltd, the world’s largest wireless carrier by users, and has been selling the smartphone through China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd since 2009 and China Telecom Corp since 2012.
Apple has 265 stores in the US with 30,000 employees, according to the company’s Web site.
Website 9to5 Mac previously reported that Apple was looking for workers in Nanjing and Dalian.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary
RSS