Start this week，iPhone 4 sales in S.Korea
South Korean telecom operator KT Corp said on Sunday its intention to begin selling the Apple iPhone in April of this week facing a growing competition to expand into the potentially lucrative market for smartphones.
KT, the country’s exclusive distributor for the widget, plans to start sending the plane on Sept. 10 to about 270,000 customers who place orders in advance, a spokesman for the company.
“Our branches will also start selling the phones after the pre-ordered items are shipped off,” he said.
KT, the second mobile operator in South Korea, has sold about 890,000 iPhones in the market entry of previous models in November.
And tens of thousands of people gathered on the company website on August 18, she began taking orders online for the latest model of popular smartphone.
Local competitors such as Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics have been striving to compete by introducing new smartphones, including the Galaxy S and Optimus series.
Samsung said Wednesday it has sold more than one million units of Galaxy S since the firm’s signature smartphone model hit the market in June.
Mobile phone market in South Korea is one of the strongest in the world with 45 million users in a population of 49 million euros. Smartphones, however, have a relatively small, suggesting a potential for growth.
Samsung Electronics estimated at about five million smartphones will be sold in the country at the end of 2010, against less than one million in 2009.
