Apple's iPhone has had a rocky road entering the Chinese market. Amidst stalled negotiations with China Mobile, domestic mobile phone distributor Dixin Tong suddenly announced that it had signed an agreement with Apple to act as its agent for domestic sales of the iPhone in China. Industry insiders have analyzed that if the iPhone were to enter the Chinese market, its first choice would be to form a strategic alliance with China Mobile and that it would be unlikely to cooperate with a mobile phone distributor. At this point, news of an agreement with Dixin Tong is more likely a negotiation strategy on Apple's part to force the other side's hand after the negotiations became deadlocked. If Apple were to cooperate with China Unicom, the iPhone could become a profit growth point for Unicom but would be unable to change the current competitive landscape of the mobile operator market.