China Unicom, a leading telecom operator in China, ordered its branches in mid-July that all the iPhones in storage without WiFi have to be sold to ensure zero inventory by the end of July in order to give way to the launch of iPhone 4, an insider of China Unicom told the China Business News on Sunday.

China Unicom branches have adjusted the price of the 32G iPhone from 6,999 yuan ($1032.13) to 5,888 yuan ($868.2) for reserved group users. This is the second price cut of 1000-yuan ($147.52) for the promotion of iPhone by China Unicom since May 1.

"Apparently, China Unicom has made a deal with Apple on the launch of iPhone 4 for the Chinese mainland market, which is scheduled to be in mid-August or early September," said a manager from an international mobile phone factory. "The company should have about 150,000 iPhones now in storage," he added.

Neither China Unicom nor Unicom Vsens, a subsidiary of China Unicom, confirmed the above information.

China's business press carried the story above on Monday. China.org.cn has not checked the stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.