Tim Cook dinner is again in China once more. This time, he is chowing down steamed buns on Chinese language social media.
The Apple CEO is in Shanghai forward of the opening of a brand new Apple retailer this week — however is ensuring he takes the time to share choose highlights of his journey to his 1.6 million-plus “followers” on the Chinese language app Weibo.
In a 22-second clip posted to his Weibo account on Wednesday, Cook dinner mentioned he’d been for a stroll alongside the Bund waterfront with Chinese language actor Zheng Kai, earlier than “having fun with a basic Shanghai breakfast.”
He adopted that up with a number of extra posts. In a single, Cook dinner shared that he stopped by a studio of a neighborhood director who was “ending manufacturing on a brief movie about women following their goals to be lion dancers.”
In one other submit, Cook dinner put the highlight on Chinese language video games developer Papergames. There was additionally time to share a photograph of himself from an Apple retailer with fashions Wang Shiqing and Ji Huanbo.
Although Cook dinner is in Shanghai to open a brand new retailer, a metropolis the place Apple already has seven, the timing of his journey coincides with a tricky second for his firm in China.
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Apple has been battling falling iPhone gross sales in China in latest months amid rising competitors from home smartphone makers and rising nationalist sentiment in Beijing.
Within the first six weeks of this yr, as an example, iPhone gross sales in China dropped 24%, per Counterpoint Analysis information. That slide is partly as a result of big reputation of native rival Huawei’s newest smartphone, the Mate 60 Professional.
On condition that the Better China area contributed $20.8 billion of Apple’s total $119.6 billion in income in its newest quarter, it is clearly a market Cook dinner will not need to lose floor in.
The Apple CEO’s final journey to China got here unannounced in October, simply as indicators have been beginning to emerge of a weakening marketplace for iPhones. So selling Apple merchandise and interesting Chinese language customers immediately is a key technique.
Cook dinner’s submit concerning the native director commented that “her crew used Apple merchandise in each stage of the artistic course of, from storyboarding with iPad to capturing on iPhone 15 Professional Max, to enhancing with Macbook Professional.”
His submit concerning the builders at Papergames additionally famous that the graphics and efficiency of their video games “present the ability of Apple silicon chips in iPhone and iPad.”
Cook dinner is aware of what he has to do.