macnn
11/13/2008, 9:05am, EST
Thursday, November 13th
True Move, Apple to bring iPhone to Thailand
True Move, owned by True Corp. and the third-largest cellular carrier in Thailand, says it has signed a deal with Apple to begin selling the iPhone in its home market. The carrier is however in the earliest phases of arranging a Thai deployment, according to Reuters, with no prices for the phone, subscriptions or pre-paid plans. Even the timing of a launch is uncertain, as True Move will only say that the iPhone is due "in the coming months."
Thailand is a comparatively new frontier for Apple, which only opened a Thai version of its online store this summer. There are no Apple retail stores in the country, though people do have access to the iTunes Store. The company's biggest forays in southeast Asia have been in surrounding nations, such as the first Chinese retail store, and Japan, where the iPhone has enjoyed healthy sales through Softbank.
Filed under: iPhone, Apple
Other story tags: Thailand, True Move
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Hardly anyone in Thailand
has iPhone money, right? Not saying nobody has enough money to buy iPhones, but it would only be about 5% of the population. Any ideas on this? Is it even worth the trouble for Apple taking the iPhone to this country?
True Move - Convergence
For people who don't really know about Thailand: There are around 300,000 iPhone (2G) currently used in the country - according to the data from the telcos here. In addition, there are already around 100,000 iPhone 3G in circulations at the moment. Taking into the fact that the iPhone is to be officially launched here. Having said that all those parallel imports handsets cost twice as expensive as those available in the USA or other places - minus the contract. So Apple will be able to sell a lot more iPhones in Thailand. No doubt about it. I would expect the sales to surpass Singapore's figures once launch. However, the decision to go with True can be a 2-edges sword. True is still in the early stage of developing its 3G network, while DTAC, the country's 2nd largest carrier, is almost ready to implement. On the other hand, True Move, backed by True Corp., has the convergence of technology from wifi hotspots and contents that will be available for iPhones during launch. Just hope they do a good job this time. It's actually their opportunity to gain more subscribers to their network.
Montana
Great, Thailand is getting iPhones now. HOW ABOUT MONTANA RIGHT HERE IN THE USA!!! We still can't get iPhones here, although we are bombarded daily with Apple's print and TV ads. Its time to unhook from AT&T.
Bangkok
Thailand is really turning the corner to become a 1st world nation. It has the largest shopping center in all of Asia as well as many other areas that make the US seem sadly behind the times. It isn't all mangoes and elephants these days.