san francisco apple inc grew revenue in china a surprisingly strong 8 while setting a record for indian iphone sales bright spots in an otherwise disappointing quarterly checkin from the worlds most valuable companythose twin milestones stood out after apple posted its third straight quarter of declining sales and predicted a similar performance in the current period hurt by an industrywide slump that has sapped demand for phones computers and tablets the ipad and macbooks maker reported a betterthanexpected 79 rise in revenue from china which includes hong kong and taiwan to 157 billion and iphone sales in india grew doubledigits to a new high though executives didnt disclose precise numbers china in particular has been a major drag on the global smartphone arena since last year and has failed to bounce back as anticipated because of postcovid economic turbulence chief executive officer tim cook suggested users in the worlds biggest mobile market were abandoning android alternatives from its biggest rivals which include xiaomi corp and huawei technologies coswitchers were a very key part of our iphone results for the quarter we did set a record cook told analysts on a postresults briefingchinas smartphone market is struggling alongside a sputtering economy shipments have shrunk every quarter since the start of 2022 as consumers tighten their budgets to deal with a postcovid downturn the market could bounce back in the fourth quarter when apple and its rivals typically release their latest devices but that growth could be weaker than expected idc predictsheavy discounting during the 618 annual june shopping festival likely propelled device sales in general but apples brand helped it outpace rivals idc analyst will wong saidapple showed that its still the best alternative in chinas highend segment despite all the tensions between the us and china he said if we look at the recent 618 shopping festival apples pricediscount promotions successfully stimulated consumer demand but of course its premium brand name allowed consumers to feel that its value for moneywhile unsurprising the indian performance also vindicates the companys renewed focus on a market where the iphone has long been beyond the reach of many consumers apple now views the fastexpanding country as both a massive retail opportunity and an important production base for its gadgets in the longer term apples revenue there grew by nearly 50 in the year through march to almost 6 billion bloomberg news has reported the company which just opened its first stores in the country is planning to extend its network in india as part of an asiawide thrust