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Apple, Tesla love affair with China ending as sales decline after users are told to shun Western products
Tesla, Apple may lose millions of customers in China, which is urging people to choose local products. The two are resorting to discounts to stay competive.
Tesla and Apple may lose millions of customers in China as the country is urging people to choose domestic products over Western technology. The companies are reportedly discounting many of their products to compete with Chinese competitors as many told the Financial Times that they are using devices from Chinese companies.
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At China’s annual Communist Party, Zhan Wenlong, a nuclear physicist and party delegate, told the outlet, “For people coming here, they encourage us to use domestic phones, because phones like Apple are not safe. [Apple phones] are made in China, but we don’t know if the chips have back doors.”
While another employee at the government-funded think tank in China, said as per the report that he and his colleagues were asked to stop using Apple devices and choose Huawei equivalents.
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“They gave us a deadline with a month and day by which we would have to stop using iPhones. They didn’t give us any subsidies, instead one day Huawei people came into our office with boxes of phones to sell, all 20 per cent off. Our whole building was fighting to get the phones," he said.
The report quoted Nong Jiagui, a teacher in Yunnan province, as saying, “Schools are told to use Chinese phones as well, to support Chinese companies."
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Not only Apple and Tesla but Western brands such as Nike and Adidas have also seen a sales drop in China as they compete with domestic products.
Tesla's Chinese competitor BYD passed Elon Musk's company for worldwide sales of electric vehicles. The company said it won't be trying to break the US market any time soon as its Chief executive Stella Li asserted, “We’re not planning to come to the US. It’s an interesting market, but it is very complicated."
