In an announcement which underscores that Apple's iPad Mini, fourth-generation iPad and iPhone 5 will hit the store shelves in China in time for the commencement of January 2013 New Year sales in the country, Apple said that the sales of the mentioned devices in China will begin within the next two weeks.

According to the Apple announcement, the iPad Mini and new iPad will hit the Apple stores as well as some authorized resellers in the People's Republic of China on December 7. The company will start open the pre-orders for both the tablets on December 6 for pickup the next day, coinciding with the official launch of the tablets in the country.

The iPhone 5, meanwhile, will be opened for pre-orders on December 13, with its pickup and sale scheduled to commence on December 14 --- almost a month earlier than that of its predecessor, the 2011-launched iPhone 4S.

The announcement by Apple has come as a surprise to the analysts because they were expecting that the shipping of the iPad Mini and the fourth-generation iPad to the Chinese markets will begin only by early next year.

In an evident reaction to Apple's announcement, Topeka Capital Markets' analyst Brian White said in a recent note to clients: "We are very surprised by the accelerated launch of the iPad Mini and fourth-generation iPad in China that we did not expect to occur this year but rather sometime in 1Q13."