China Shutting Down Some (But Not All!) Fake Apple Stores…

from the and-they'll-pop-back-up... dept

With all the attention paid last week to the news of completely fake Apple stores popping up in China, you figured Chinese officials had to do something. Apparently, they started investigating, and shut down some of the fake Apple stores that were found in Kunming city. Perhaps most interesting, however, is that they let some of the stores stay open — including the very story discovered by the BirdAbroad blog, which kicked off all of this attention. Apparently, officials found that that particular store “has a licence to trade and is selling genuine Apple products.”

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Comments on “China Shutting Down Some (But Not All!) Fake Apple Stores…”

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17 Comments
william (profile) says:

Let me raise this curiosity if it haven’t hit you yet.

The “fake” apple store got shut down because they don’t have the proper business license, like if you run a store in your garage without registering/paying for a business license.

They didn’t get shut down because they “copied” apple store.

Is it a copyrightable “expression” on how apple stores are set up?

Anonymous Coward says:

Green Light

There you go. Get your valid “license to trade” and buy your Apple products from “ghost shifts” in factories, then you are golden. Away you go, complete with official blessing. Of course, a license might mean a few under-the-table payments to certain important local party officials. So be it. The factory has to be making genuine Apple products or be good enough to be convincing. That fake Apple store is no longer fake, it’s official. Apple has no hope of winning any lawsuit against these guys.

Apple has now officially lost control over its dealer network in China. They can expect a vast collection of copycat stores. Apple’s market share is now about to rocket up in China. If Apple intelligently plays its cards, that it has been dealt by China, Apple can still make a lot of money out of the new situation. This is going to be a real test for Apple management.

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