The first generation of Apple electronic watches will be available in Russia “in white” on the last day of this month. But it won’t affect the earnings of Apple Watch game developers.
Information about the imminent start of sales appeared on the Russian Apple website. According to her, it will be possible to purchase a gadget in the Russian Apple Online Store on July 31 from seven in the morning one minute, presumably Moscow time.
The price of the Apple Watch Sport, a budget line of watches, will start at 23,990 rubles (in the US, the price tag starts at $349). For the basic Apple Watch line, you will have to pay at least 37,990 rubles (in the US, at least $ 549). As for the most expensive series – Apple Watch Edition – it will cost users at least 660 thousand rubles (exactly $ 10 thousand in the States). However, it is not worth waiting for in July: the Edition will officially appear in Russia at the end of 2015.
The new watch, according to Vedomosti, will also be available for purchase at the Apple Shop TSUM, iPort, Re:Store and C-store. By the way, according to the publication “Business Petersburg”, yesterday representatives of “Euroset”, “M.Video” and “Svyaznoy”, one of the largest Russian retailers of digital equipment, did not have data on the start date of sales. This can partly be explained by Apple’s desire to position the watch as a fashion accessory. For this reason, the company, in theory, can give priority attention to working with boutiques, and not with large chains.
Considering this, as well as the fact that since the start of official Internet sales in the countries of the “first wave” (USA, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, France, Germany, Hong Kong, China, Japan) on April 24, they are available in Russia on the “gray market”, it is hardly worth waiting for a boom in sales: all those who really wanted to buy them have done it for a long time.
In general, there is a lack of euphoria around the device: According to the analyst of the Chinese investment company KGI Ming-Chi Kuo, by the end of June, global sales of the gadget amounted to only about 3.9 million.
This can partly be explained by the fact that the Apple Watch was not available at retail at all until June 18 of this year. Now their sales regularly start in various regions: on June 26, they began in Spain, Italy, Mexico, Singapore, Switzerland, South Korea and Taiwan, on July 17 in the Netherlands, Sweden and Thailand, and on the 31st, respectively, they will begin in Russia.
Anyway, the current 3.9 million is not at all the figure that can satisfy developers of free software for them. As noted by the COO of the British studio Bossa Studios Vince Farquharson at the conference Develop: Brighton 2015, their game Spy_Watch is unlikely to pay off its budget. At the same time, it was developed for only two months. And, it is clear that sales in Russia, even with the most optimistic forecasts, will not change the picture.