Tesla and Apple’s China sales plunge as Chinese told to ditch Western products

Tesla and Apple could be about to lose millions of customers in China as the state pushes people to opt for domestic products rather than Western technology.
Both companies have reportedly been forced into discounting many of their products to compete with Chinese competitors.
Many at China’s annual Communist Party event told the Financial Times that they are using devices from Chinese companies.
Zhan Wenlong, a nuclear physicist and party delegate, told the outlet: “For people coming here, they encourage us to use domestic phones, because phones like Apple are not safe.
“[Apple phones] are made in China, but we don’t know if the chips have back doors.”
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Guo, an employee at the government-funded think tank in China, told the outlet that he and his colleagues were told to ditch their Apple devices for Huawei equivalents.
He said: “They gave us a deadline with a month and day by which we would have to stop using iPhones.
“They didn’t give us any subsidies, instead one day Huawei people came into our office with boxes of phones to sell, all 20 per cent off. Our whole building was fighting to get the phones.”
Nong Jiagui, a teacher in Yunnan province, added: “Schools are told to use Chinese phones as well, to support Chinese companies.”
Other Western brands such as Nike and Adidas have also seen a sales slump in China amid increased competition from domestic products.
Tesla’s shares dropped more than seven percent this week after another sales decline in China.
Tesla, owned by Elon Musk, sold 60,365 China-made vehicles in February, down 19 percent from a year earlier, Reuters reports.
Chinese competitor, BYD, passed Tesla for worldwide sales of electric vehicles.
BYD, which stands for Build Your Dreams, is a former battery manufacturer that has now enjoyed great success in the electric car market.
On a more positive note for Musk’s company, BYD has said it won’t be trying to break the US market any time soon.
Chief executive Stella Li said: “We’re not planning to come to the US. It’s an interesting market, but it is very complicated.”