At 8:00 am on September 20, the Apple iPhone 16 series was officially launched in major Apple stores. At 10:08 on the same day, the Huawei MateXT extraordinary master who had opened an appointment earlier was also officially launched. Huawei and Apple, the two global consumer electronics giants, once again competed head-on.
The iPhone 16 is on sale less than in previous years
At about 9 am on the same day, a reporter from Securities Times E Company came to Apple Yitian Holiday Plaza store and saw that the entrance of the store was still the same as in previous years, showing a long queue of users who had booked a new machine waiting to pick up the new machine, but the flow of people was slightly less than in previous years. At the same time, around the store, as in previous years, there were many "scalpers" of the iPhone 16 series on site.
"We only accept the iPhone16 Pro Max, with a price increase of 200 yuan. We will not accept it in the afternoon. We are also betting on the market now. The price of Huawei’s three-fold screen is about 20,000, and the price increase of 20,000 to 30,000 cannot be received. The total price will be sold to 50,000 to 60,000." At 9 am on September 20, the "scalper" who recycled the iPhone 16 series at the entrance of the store told reporters.
There are also a small number of "scalpers" who say that the iPhone 16 Pro version is also accepted, but the price increase is very small, only 50 yuan to 100 yuan per unit.
"It’s not even enough for the taxi fare," someone who has just received Apple’s new phone for sale told reporters.
The reporter saw at the scene that there were also some "fruit fans" who had not pre-ordered the iPhone 16 on Apple’s official website and tried to increase the price on the spot to buy a new machine. For them, this year’s price increase was acceptable, "I didn’t get it on the official website before, I’m going to buy a Pro Max512G black from scalpers, and the price increase is 500 yuan. I feel that the price is okay."
In comparison, in previous years iPhone new products on sale, consumers from the market to buy Pro and above versions generally need to increase the price of 800 yuan to thousands of yuan, last year iPhone15 Pro Max had the highest price increase of more than 2000 yuan.
In terms of the basic version of iPhone16, there has been a "break" before the sale. It is understood that on September 19, the day before the launch of the iPhone16 series, the price of the iPhone 16 official website started from 5999, and the subsidy price of Pinduoduo started from 5399 yuan, a direct drop of 600 yuan; iPhone 16 Plus (512GB) official website price was 9999 yuan, and the subsidy price of Pinduoduo was 8999 yuan. The discount was as high as 1,000 yuan.
Today, the reporter found that some offline stores can directly buy iPhone 16, and the price is 200 yuan – 300 yuan lower than the official website.
In the early morning of September 10, Apple officially released the iPhone 16 series. iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus start at 5,999 yuan and 6,999 yuan respectively. iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus have five colors to choose from, namely black, white, pink, dark cyan and ultra cyan. iPhone 16 Pro 128GB starts at 7,999 yuan, iPhone 16 Pro Max 256GB starts at 9,999 yuan. The iPhone 16 Pro series has a total of four colors, including white titanium, black titanium, primary color titanium and the latest "desert titanium".
On September 13, after the iPhone 16 series opened for pre-order, recently, Tianfeng Securities analyst Guo Mingyu released data showing that the iPhone 16 series sold about 37 million units in the first weekend of pre-order, a decrease of about 12.7% compared with the same period of iPhone 15 series last year.
Kuo said one of the biggest reasons for iPhone sales this year was lower than expected demand for the iPhone 16 Pro series. In addition, the failure of Apple Intelligence, the biggest selling point of the iPhone 16 series, to launch at the same time as the iPhone 16 series is also affecting sales. According to Apple, the Chinese, French, Japanese and Spanish versions of Apple Intelligence will be available as soon as next year.
Yu Chengdong: Working overtime to expand production capacity
It is worth mentioning that on the same day as the iPhone 16 series went on sale, Huawei MateXT Extraordinary Master also went on sale at 10:08 today.
At around 10 am that day, the reporter came to Huawei Yitian Holiday Plaza store and found that the store was ready for the sale of Huawei MateXT Extraordinary Master, and there were a small number of users who snapped up the machine online (Huawei Mall).
At the same time, the store also showcased two new Huawei MateXT Extraordinary Master red and black machines, but unlike other new machines displayed by Huawei, the Huawei MateXT Extraordinary Master displayed in the store has a transparent glass box locked on the periphery, and the store can only experience the appearance, temporarily unable to experience it with your own hands.
"We have a fixed time to display the machine and for consumers to experience the machine. At present, this model only accepts information registration and reservation, and the time to get the real machine is to be determined." The staff in the store told reporters.
Before the sale (23:59 on September 19), the official website data of Huawei Mall shows that as of now, the number of reservations for Huawei Mate XT has reached 6.622 million.
After the panic buying started, all models of Mate XT Extraordinary Master were "empty in seconds". At present, online platforms such as Huawei Mall, JD.com, and Tmall Flagship Store all show "temporarily out of stock".
On the morning of the same day, Yu Chengdong, executive director of Huawei, chairperson of end point BG, and chairperson of smart car solutions BU, appeared at the flagship store on Nanjing East Road in Shanghai to attend the first delivery ceremony of Huawei Mate XT extraordinary master.
Yu Chengdong said at the delivery ceremony that the popularity of Huawei’s triple-folding mobile phone far exceeded expectations, and the team is working overtime to expand production capacity.
"We can’t grab it even if we want to buy it ourselves," a Huawei employee told reporters.
Reporters in some domestic second-hand platforms found that Huawei MateXT extraordinary prices as high as 68,000 yuan/unit.
Huawei Mate XT Extraordinary Master was officially released on September 10, Beijing time, priced at 19999 yuan to 23,999 yuan, providing 256GB, 512GB and 1TB models. On online platforms such as Huawei Mall and Tmall flagship store, the same user can only buy one.
On September 19, Guo Mingsheng issued a document saying that the latest supply chain survey shows that due to the high demand in the market, the shipment forecast of Huawei’s three-fold mobile phone Mate XT in 2024 has been doubled, and it has been raised from the 500,000 department to the 1 million department.
Ethan Qi, associate director of research at Counterpoint, told reporters that the launch of this new product can solidify Huawei’s technological leadership in the field of folding screens. To a certain extent, this is the right strategy, because this process will help Huawei accumulate experience in developing more complex folding smartphones. In addition, as folding screen technology becomes more mature, consumers are more and more accepting of folding screen phones. It is very wise for Huawei to choose this time to launch new products with more acceptable weight, thickness and reliability. Now may be a good time for Huawei to take the folding design to a new level.