Following the Union Budget announcement Apple reduced the prices across the iPhone lineup. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that the basic customs duty (BCD) on imported mobile phones and components will be lowered from 20% to 15%.
After this announcement Apple slashed the price from Rs 300 for the made-in-India iPhone 13, iPhone 14 and iPhone 15 models, Rs 2,300 for iPhone SE and to up to Rs 6,000 for the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max. This is the first time when Apple has slashed the price of current generation Pro models.
The decision of the price cut has come amid falling sales in mainland China where Apple saw a decline of 2% in the market share in second quarter of this year in comparison to the second quarter of last year. As per the Canalys research analyst Lucas Zhong “Apple is facing a bottleneck in mainland China,”.
Despite these price cuts Apple Pro models remains the expensive as the import duty is 15% with a 1% surge charge and 18% GST. The upcoming Pro and Pro Max models can come with some price cuts though Canalys says that the company can do it in the form of promotional discounts rather than offering them directly to the customers. Apart from this Android smartphone brands can also leverage this opportunity by bringing premium phones and foldable/flip phones in India with aggressive prices in a price-sensitive market like India.
