Now that its trademark fight with ProView has been settled for a cool $60 million, Apple this morning issued a release announcing the new iPad will finally land on store shelves in China on Friday, July 20. Both cellular and WiFi models of the new iPad will be on offer in the 1.33 billion people market, through both its few retail stores and authorized resellers…
The iPad will be hitting mainland China two months following its U.S. debut. Â The company did not announce price points in yuan, instead mentioning suggested retail prices in U.S. dollars.
From the release:
The new iPad Wi-Fi models will be available in black or white for a suggested retail price of $499 (US) for the 16GB model, $599 (US) for the 32GB model and $699 (US) for the 64GB model. The iPad Wi-Fi + Cellular models will be available for a suggested retail price of $629 (US) for the 16GB model, $729 (US) for the 32GB model and $829 (US) for the 64GB model.
The company will begin accepting reservation requests daily from 9am to 12pm beginning Thursday, July 19 for pick up the following day.
The reservation policy is Apple’s way of fighting scalpers that purchase devices in bulk for the purpose of reselling them on gray market and turning (often) substantial profit. While Apple’s own online and retail stores in the country adhere to this policy, Apple’s authorized resellers do not so Apple’s fight on scalpers will have limited effects.
Like in the United States and elsewhere, Apple will also offer the iPad 2 in China at a reduced price of $399 for the 16GB WiFi version.