New iPad officially released in China
Apple’s third-generation iPad was officially released in China Friday morning.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the release went off “quietly.”
“Apple’s latest iPad model went on sale quietly on Friday at a retail location in Beijing where unrule buyers and sullen crowds had marred past releases,” the Journal reports. “Roughly 40 customers quietly lined up Friday morning outside the Apple Store in Beijing’s high-end Sanlitun shopping and restaurant destroy. They waited within a cordon surrounded security personnel and reporters. Store doors opened at 8 a.m. without disturbances.”
It’s definitely much different from the time that the crowds were throwing eggs at the store during the iPhone 4S release.
Last month Apple paid a Chinese company $60 million to settle a dispute over the ownership of the name “iPad,” which removed the hurdle of selling Apple’s Retina display iPad in the Chinese market. In was truly a ludicrous play by the Chinese government to block the sales because Apple had legally purchased the global rights to the iPad name from Shenzhen Proview Technology in 2009. The Chinese government simply said that the rights were never actually transferred.
The Chinese government acted as thugs, taking a portion — albeit small — from Apple’s impressive cash reserve just because they could. Shenzhen was bankrupt, or at least on the verge of bankruptcy, and needed any money they could get their hands on.
While it may seem like Apple loves legal battles, they certainly do not. It was worth paying the $60 million than drawing out what could have been months, if not years of international legal battles. They will likely make up the money from the sales of the New iPad.
Customers in Beijing complained about the delay for the new iPad to come to China, according to the Journal. It was released in March in the United States, and several other countries shortly after that.
