Apple Bolsters Ties With China's Leadership

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Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook met with senior Chinese leader Li Keqiang this week, in the strongest signal yet that the company is strengthening ties in a market it long neglected.

The executive met with Mr. Li on March 27 to discuss intellectual-property issues and greater cooperation, according to state media. In its evening news, state-run China Central Television showed Mr. Li meeting with Cook at Zhongnanhai, the closely guarded compound here that houses China's top leaders. It is a setting that senior Chinese officials often use for visiting foreign dignitaries and projects an image of growing ties between the gadget maker and the country that makes—and, increasingly, buys—its products. Mr. Li, currently China's vice premier, is expected to succeed Premier Wen Jiabao next year as part of a broad once-a-decade leadership change.

The meeting came as Apple awaits a decision from a Chinese high court in Guangdong province on whether it has the rights to the iPad name in China, Apple's largest market outside the U.S.


Apple Bolsters Ties With China's Leadership