China Unicom has ordered an extremely large number of iPhones for an initial wave of sales, says the International Business Times. Quoting local media sources, the Times claims that Unicom has ordered 5 million units from Apple, at a price of 10 billion yuan. Each phone is thus worth roughly 2,000 yuan, or $293, before markup.

Although Apple sold only 5.2 million iPhones worldwide in the last quarter, a Chinese population of over 1.3 billion is expected to sustain a significant market. Apple is in fact said to have made a number of concessions to win Unicom's support, including taking only 1,000 to 1,100 yuan from the sale of each device, rather than a normal dividend of 20 to 30 percent. The Chinese iPhone is also said to lack Wi-Fi support, in keeping with government restrictions.

An 8GB iPhone will reportedly cost 2,400 yuan, while pricing of a 16GB model is expected to be 4,800 yuan. Sales could begin as soon as September, which stands in contrast with recent predictions that the phone would only launch in 2010.

Two major obstacles await Apple and Unicom, those being smuggled iPhones and imitation devices. Gray-market iPhones can cost as little as 400 or 1,000 yuan in the country, a much more affordable price for the average person. Similarly, a number of Chinese companies have been manufacturing imitation iPhones, which are cheaper if inferior in function.

None of the companies involved have made an official announcement of an iPhone deal.