Apple flavors up its products for Chinese tastes

Screenshots show the tweets posted on Twitter account (left) and Weibo account of Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc. The overall tweets on both social media platform present the face-to-face communication between the boss of the world's first publicly traded companies by market share and his customers.

"Apple takes Chinese consumer tastes into account when it designs many of its products," said Tim Cook, the chief executive, in an interview to the Chinese-language version of Bloomberg Businessweek on June 17.

According to the interview, Cook underscored the importance of the Greater China market by saying that the company incorporates many details, including color palettes, based on Chinese tastes.

The decision to offer a gold iPhone last year reflects in part the popularity of that color among Chinese users, he added.

According to data compiled by Bloomberg, Greater China accounted for 29 percent of Apple's revenue in the March quarter.

The company's CEO has visited China six times.

According to bloomberg.com, Cook made his remarks during a tour to China last month that took him to the company's largest store worldwide, in the eastern city of Hangzhou.

That tour marked the latest visit to the country since Cook took the baton from Steve Jobs.

In the interview, Cook said the Apple watch is off to a promising start and has attracted more developer interest than the earliest iPhones and iPads had.

On the same day, Cook told Xinhua News Agency that Apple Inc is in talks with Chinese banks and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd on launching the firm's mobile payment system in China.

"We very much want to get Apple Pay in China," said Cook during the interview. "I'm very bullish on Apple Pay in China."

On May 11, Cook signed up a micro-blog account on Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like social media site based in the Chinese mainland, hoping to attract Apple fans.

The account, which currently has 668,919 followers, attracted about 200,000 users in the first hour of its debut.