Sticker shock: Apple hikes prices of iPhones by 29%

Apple might have been forced to hike the price of iPhone 6 by 29 percent in the country as the company’s new smartphone, iPhone SE, saw a poor response selling only a few thousand units

Apple might have been forced to hike the price of iPhone 6 by 29 percent in the country as the company’s new smartphone, iPhone SE, saw a poor response selling only a few thousand units

Apple might have been forced to hike the price of iPhone 6 by 29 percent in the country as the company's new smartphone, iPhone SE, saw a poor response selling only a few thousand units.

The company was on a discount-offering spree for the period of January-March 2016 and finally deceided to withdraw them in order to promote the sell of the SE.

"It was felt that SE, which was criticised for having a 'high price tag', will not be able to see much traction if prices of bigger-sized iPhone 6 and 6S devices are not corrected. So, the decision was taken to revise the price upwards," TOI quoted a source as saying.

Currently, the 16GB 4-inch iPhone SE sells at ₹39,000 while a similar specked (16GB) version of iPhone 6 is available at ₹31,000 and 6S at ₹40,500. "After the revision, iPhone 6 costs ₹40,000 and 6S comes for ₹48,000. We are trying to build a healthy buffer," the source added.

The current decision will also see a 22 percent rise in price for the iPhone 5S which was selling at ₹18,000. The revised price is expected to be around ₹22,000. Apple has also come out with corporate offers and EMI plans to push sales.

The company had held a meeting before it launched the SE in India and had deceided to keep the stock of SE at a low level. The source said that the decision was a part of the new strategy to pitch the new iPhone more effectively.

The company seems to be worried as Samsung's new smartphones - Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge- saw better response and managed to sell nearly twice the numbers achieved by the previous-generation models in the same period.

"Another problem for SE in India is the small screen size. Indians are increasingly buying larger screen-sized phones, even at the lower-end of the market. A lot of data is consumed on smart devices and smaller ones do not find much favour with buyers," sources said.