WeChat holds up iPhone sales in China

An app that does just about everything blocks iPhone sales in China.

The Chinese market is a tough one to crack for a variety of reasons ranging from its own innovative business environment to government regulations. Apple’s iPhone discovered this when it came up against WeChat, a home-grown Chinese messaging app-cum-mobile operating system that was developed six years ago by Tencent Holdings.

WeChat is a hybrid service that has put together components from apps such as Uber, Slack, Venmo, WhatsApp and more. Chinese consumers can use it for a variety of reasons from booking tickets to fixing doctor visits. The WeChat app includes cashless and credit-card-free payments through the WeChat Wallet. For a Chinese user, just this one app takes care of all her online - and offline - needs. WeChat crossed 700 million active users in April 2016.

Although iPhones too support WeChat, the fact that it is cheaper to use Android devices makes Apple’s task that much harder. Chinese customers see no reason to not opt for a cheaper smartphone. The facts are startling: only half of the iPhone Chinese users in 2015 choose to go for an iPhone in 2016.

Source : http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2017/05/03/iphone_sales_hit_a_roadblock_in_china_because_of_wechat_which_does_basically.html