iPhone X may go off the shelves as Apple cuts retailers' margin by 30%

Apple Inc. has reportedly slashed the retailers’ margin on the anniversary edition iPhone X by nearly 30 per cent, according to a new report in the Economic Times.

While other brand manufacturers offer retailers’ a margin of 10-15 per cent on their latest mobiles, Apple has been offering 6.5 per cent on the newly launch iPhone X. Now, the company has reportedly reduced the retailers’ margin to 4.5 per cent, which is almost 30 per cent less.

Subhash Chandra, managing director at Sangeetha Mobiles, told the Economic Times that the margins have been reduced from 6.5 per cent to 4.5 per cent and it further reduces to mere 1.5-2 per cent if the customer opts to pay by card for the iPhone X.

According to the report, India’s leading brands -- Samsung and Xiaomi -- offer more than double the margin that Apple offers -- around 12-15 per cent. Other mobile phone manufacturers, especially Chinese brands such as Oppo and Vivo, offer higher than usual margins to retailers to gain market share.

For offline retailers, rising competition from the e-commerce industry is already a major concern. Now, some of the retail channels have stopped stocking iPhones due to lack of control on retail pricing in the online and offline markets.