Comments on: Samsung’s new low cost mobiles for India

By: petabro

petabro — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 06:38:57 +0000

Made the correction earlier. You should read all the posts - not just the first one

By: mehul

mehul — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 23:56:40 +0000

Petabro: the RAZOR is already in indian market. However, it is not as famous as it is here.

By: maulinkumar rao

maulinkumar rao — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 22:18:51 +0000

it is very difficult to understand the power of mass in current economy. imagine a can which is selling for 3000$ (yes brand new) will be largest selling model in few years. if 1 percent of population start is captured by this phones companies will make more money.

By: S R Raja

S R Raja — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 11:19:17 +0000

I wonder how these phone manufacturers manage to stay profitable with a low cost handset product line - with which they expect to proliferate the market.

Consider this: According to research reports mobile companies have lost billions of $$ in terms of return and repair for handsets.

Considering that the R&R is priced in for the low cost phone - I still am not convinced that the market for "low" cost phones is viable.

If you are targeting the rural rich and the urban poor - the so called poor - let me tell you this - They will "spend" money - hard earned money for a cool gadget and nothing cheap!

By: its4us2think

its4us2think — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 17:55:55 +0000

DrDoubt said: "This will severely limit the potential services set : its just voice and sms, really."

In Indian market thats all matters, Lot of comments here have already said about this, Indian market is not like American market where you sell a handset at discount and milk the money through contracts. Majority there is prepaid customers who enjoy the benefits of free (unlimited) incoming calls and just Rs 1 per minute for outgoing calls (2cents).

Of course there is a segment of people who wants to show off their phones, and that market is also quite sizable, but it is nothing compared to the vegetable vendors and others where good growth potential is there.

By: Sampath

Sampath — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 16:02:57 +0000

difficult to do service agreement stuff in india (as they dont have a national SSN type scheme and no credit bureaus)..Reliance tried doing something similar whne they launched. everyone just took the handset and ran with it and never paid any bill, treating it a as a prepaid disposable phone..

also arpu boost and churn redux will not be enough to subsidize handsets…so it may be a non starter

By: petabro

petabro — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 15:48:17 +0000

Petabro meant Blackjack in the first post

By: Shripriya

Shripriya — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 09:34:22 +0000

This is smart. There are clearly two ends to the market in India, just like in many other markets. Your vegetable vendor is not going to buy the Q, but he already has a phone, so that's the market. And it is huge.

By: DrDoubt

DrDoubt — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 09:00:54 +0000

This is probably a good tactic for the short run, but a poor strategy in the long run. If you dump low capability handsets in the market, the capability to introduce Value Added Services goes down drastically.
The correct thing to do would be to introduce the service agreement stuff and provide good handsets.
This will severely limit the potential services set : its just voice and sms, really.

By: petabro

petabro — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 08:59:53 +0000

Wonder when the RAZR gets introduced in India