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More news from this year’s Mobile World Congress, this time from chip maker Marvell. They are claiming a revolutionary development and all for around $100.
Most recently, Marvell has launched its new chipset for e-readers and aimed to bring down the price. Well, now they have developed a new processor range for phones, the Pantheon 910 and 920. Along with the new processors, Marvell is claiming that they can easily bring the price of smart phones down!
With the price of most smartphones out there retailing for hundreds of dollars, Marvell’s Pantheon powered phones propose to handle similar power requirements at a fraction of the cost. Marvell’s vice president Weili Dai claims it “makes the vision of a mass market $99 smartphone very real.”
I know, I for one, would love to see a price drop in Android devices! If there are potentials to get the price of a Nexus One from $529 down to somewhere near $99 would make the phone appeal to a far larger crowd and help Android reach the masses.
[via ElectricPig]
Wouldn’t the other parts of the phone have to come down in price too first? Or is the CPU the most expensive part of the phone that it can by it self bring the price down? That doesn’t make much sense.
What makes you think they’ll pass the cost savings along to consumers?
Well, the screen is often the most expensive part… I don’t think we’ll be seeing $100 Nexus Ones anytime soon, but maybe a slower model with a low-res screen… sadly, they’d all be GSM anyway, so I would have no chance of getting one over here on Sprint.
can’t find anything on how fast these “cheap” chips are… prob won’t till MWC but if anyone finds info please post here might not even be worth it if they compete with last gen chips…
Yeah sure the Nexus One could get down to $99 … in like 5 years when they will release the Nexus Five I’m sure you will be able to buy Nexus One for less than $99!
Haha, ya I don’t think they’re talking about bringing a nexus one type phone to the market for $99.
But an unlocked CLIQ or MyTouch3G for around $100? YES PLEASE! Would be perfect for preteens, teenagers, moms, etc.
haha i love it when people say “a fraction of the cost”. it could be 29/30 of the price, and than would still be correct.
5/3 is also a fraction. granted an improper one, but a fraction nonetheless.
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unfortunately i doubt the consumers will see the change. marvell just basically brought more income to the producers.
According to the Nexus One breakdown the processor only accounts for $30 of the build cost… even if this chip costs $1 it would only lower the total build cost by $29…
http://phandroid.com/2010/01/10/nexus-one-parts-cost-174-15/
Google can order HTC to manufacture a million Nexus Ones for $150 a piece tomorrow.
Nexus One could be sold at $150 unlocked tomorrow if Google decided not to make any profits on the hardware.
Then in terms of subsidizing it down to $99, that is possible because Google can make more than $50 in ads per year that the phone is used. Even free voice and web browsing can be subsidized by ads. Or Google could sell pre-paid on-demand bandwidth.
People…part costs, manufacturing costs, shipping costs, import costs, development costs……these are what you are paying for when you purchase a new phone. Just cause the parts cost $150 as reported, doesn’t mean the phone costs $150 to make and get into your hand. Don’t get me wrong…Google is making a pretty penny off of the phones they are selling….but its not a $400 profit like some think. That being said, dropping the cost of a single component of the phone is not going to drop the overall price much at all. Yet again….another uninformed article brought to you by Phandroid.com.
Here’s the thing… cell phone list prices are pure fiction. Consider the “free” phones you get from any of the major US cellular network companies. My wife has one of these.. free with contract, about $25-$30 total manufacturing cost. The MSRP: $199!
The reasons are all about the telcos. They want consumers to think the price of phones are crazy, so they never question the “free/cheap with contract” thing. Plus, if you decide to jump ship and break the contract, you get to pay off that all-too-expensive phone.
There was hope that Google would change this trend with the N1, but clearly, the money was just too sweet. But even on smartphones, do the math. The iPod Touch is already overpriced. I bought one for my son for Christmas, about $210 for a 16GB version.. a decent deal (which is hard enough to get on an iPod.. Apple’s all about the price controls). So add in $30 for a cellular modem, $1.00 for a microphone, $2.00 for Bluetooth chip.. and you don’t get anywhere near $600+.
Now, I’m an engineer, working in consumer electronics for decades. I don’t know what Apple pays for these things, but I do know the volume prices others are paying. The only way that $210 + $40 = $600 … er, is it even the 16GB iPhone at $599 MSRP, or is that the 8GB model?
@DroidDev and Charbax
Hi intelligent readers. Don’t see many of you commenting on Phandroid posts.
Did someone seem to forget the cost in overhead? Testing? Packaging? Shipping? Development? Every other thing involved in the just the process of getting a phone made outside of parts? You will not see a decent smartphone for under $200 in the U.S. for quite some time. If ever.
i agree that more than just the processor will have to come down in price to make a dent. another option would be to include solutions like the TI WiLink 7. Which is also being showcased at the upcoming MWC. It has WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS and FM all on one tiny chip.
http://focus.ti.com/general/docs/wtbu/wtbuproductcontent.tsp?templateId=6123&navigationId=12859&contentId=67453
i love that the demo video uses android to show off the capabilities of the chip
that link claims:
# 30% reduction in total bill of materials (BOM)
# 50% smaller form factor than previous generation solution with separate GPS chip
When are you people going to understand, we want the cost of the plans to go down, and the phone. ill pay for a three hundred dollar phone, but i want a cheaper freaking plan. Come on carriers this is all you.
Putting aside their lower cost, how powerful are these chips? Are they roughly Snapdragon level, or just Qualcomm 528 level?
Seriously. I know you’re an avid supporter and all, but do you have to be such a jock strap? N1 to $100? You can’t possibly really be a developer. ^^; Anyway, I appreciate the news feed, but I think you’re just making Android supporters look foolish with this level of rampant fanboyism.
I remember an article I read 4 years ago when android was an idea. It claimed that a large cost of phones was the manufacturer’s cost to purchase the OS. The article claimed that android being open source would be free to manufacturers and we would see $100 and even free android phones.
I got a G1 2 months after it came out for $99!
$150 is material and manufacturing costs.
Google does not spend anything on marketing.
Shipping from China costs $1 per phone on shipping containers by sea.
R&D is a fixed cost. Google and partners can sell a billion Android phones when they reach sub $100 unlocked no contract no subscriptions prices.
The question is simply does Google and partners want to destroy the telco’s existing business model or not.
Sciphone is selling the Sciphone 19 running android 1.5 for around $150, so these prices are not impossible to reach. Now I agree that the scipghone 19 only has a QVGA screen, a slow 400 mhz CPU, little memory and storage and is practicaly impossible to upgrade to latter versions of Android, but over time the specs of phones in that price range should improve.
Meh, in 10 years we’ll see smart phones at the prices of regular ol’ cell phones. It happened to digital cameras, dvd players, etc etc