14 DAY TRIAL // Apple is known as a company that uses its power for all kinds of more or less controversial decisions in its relationship with partners across the world, and a new report from South Korea points to such an example that’s impacting telecom carriers.
ET News writes that the country’s three largest carriers, namely SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus, are being required by Apple to make the switch to a new sales system for the iPhone that would essentially come down to replacing Windows PCs with iOS.
Apple, however, isn’t just pushing for carriers to replace PCs with iPads to sell service plans and iPhones, but to actually spend their own money for this new system. The company wants this to happen as fast as possible because it aims the new sales system to be ready by the time it opens the flagship store in Seoul in early 2018.
Each carrier to spend millions of dollars
It goes without saying that carriers aren’t at all pleased with Apple’s aggressive approach, but they say there’s no other option than to comply with the requirements because of the success the iPhone records in the local market.
“Apple is making unfair demands. The system handles sensitive personal information. In order to stabilize the system, it would take months not to mention the extra costs,” a retailer who asked not to be named told the source.
“Telecom carriers may not be able to resist Apple’s demands considering loyal customers of iPhone and the already heated competition among them. We have no other option but to accept the demands,” a telecom company representative continued.
It’s estimated that replacing Windows-based computers with an iOS sales system would cost up to several millions of dollars, and carriers would have to spend their own money just to comply with Apple’s requirements.
At this point, the Cupertino-based tech giant hasn’t offered any comment on this report, and there’s a chance it’ll remain tight-lipped as it rarely discusses such sensitive matters.