Go to contents

Apple’s iPhone X to arrive in Korea on Nov. 24 with heftiest price tags

Apple’s iPhone X to arrive in Korea on Nov. 24 with heftiest price tags

Posted November. 09, 2017 07:48,   

Updated November. 09, 2017 09:56

한국어

The iPhone X, Apple Inc.’s 10th anniversary edition of its iPhone, will arrive in South Korea on November 24. Apple said that it will start sales of its top-of-the-line smartphone on the day in 13 additional countries including South Korea, Thailand, Turkey and Malaysia, following its initial launch in some 50 countries on November 3.

The announcement came amid expectations that the iPhone X will not be available to customers in Korea until December or early next year. The iPhone X will be the most expensive smartphone ever in South Korea, as the 64-gigabyte model is priced at 1.42 million won (1,275 U.S. dollars) and the 256-gigabyte version at 1.63 million won (1,464 dollars).

Apple has been haunted by a series of negative new since the launch of the iPhone 8 and the iPhone X. The former has been skipped by many consumers due to its lack of differentiation from its predecessor, the iPhone 7. It is estimated that some 140,000 units of the iPhone 8 have been sold in South Korea since its launch, equivalent to just 60 to 70 percent of the previous model.

Due to the iPhone 8’s slower-than-expected sales, Apple’s market share fell slightly for the third quarter of this year from a year earlier. According to U.S. market research agency Strategy Analytics, California-based Cupertino shipped 12 million iPhones in the July-September period in the United States, holding 30.4 percent of the market. While Apple maintained its top share of the U.S. market, the market share was down 2.1 percent from a year earlier. Samsung Electronics Co. ranked second with a 25.7 percent share of the U.S. market by shipping 10.7 million smartphones, followed by LG Electronics Inc. with a 17 percent share, China’s ZTE with 11.3 percent and Motorola with 5 percent.

Samsung edged Apple to take the top share of 33.7 percent in the second quarter, while the U.S. maker had just a 25.4 percent share. Although Samsung lost the top spot to Apple again, the Korean company performed relatively well, as Apple usually shows strong sales performances in the third quarter with the release of its new products. In the same quarter of 2016, Apple had a 33.1 percent share, while Samsung took a 24.4 percent share. Apple’s shipment fell 9 percent in the third quarter of this year to become the only one among the top-five smartphone makers that saw a reduction in shipment.



Jae-Hee Kim jetti@donga.com