Undoubtedly being touted and reported as the world cheapest smartphone was certainly going to raise some eyebrows and it surely did. The Freedom 251, launched yesterday, met with some hitches that has affected the sales of the product.
By the way, as at the time of this report, the website is still not available. The company had announced that it would take online bookings from Feb. 18. Due to the “enormous response, servers were overloaded”. Ringing Bells, the manufacturer promises that the site would be back within 24 hours
A bigger problem is the fact that yesterday, the country’s mobile industry body Indian Cellular Association expressed its surprise that Ringing Bells managed to come up with a smartphone at a price as low as Rs 251. It argues that the phone could not be below Rs 3,500 ($51) even after subsidies.
According to ICA national president Pankaj Mohindroo in a letter,
“For your kind information, the bill of material (BOM) value for a product like this when sourced from the cheapest supply chain cost approximately USD 40 (Rs 2,700).
“And this, when translated into retail price after addition of applicable duties, taxes and with distribution and retail margins would be at least Rs 4,100 while the product is being sold at Rs 251,” ICA national president Pankaj Mohindroo said in the letter. He further added that even if the product is sold at lower margins in an e-commerce type subsidised sale, the final consumer price cannot come below $52-55 (about Rs.3,500-3,800).
“Further, there is no visible mobile operator subsidy involved in this, which in any case is not the way the Indian mobile market operates,” he added. Mohindroo said it would be advisable that officers from Deity get into the depth of this and ICA will provide any technical assistance, if required.
“We are bringing this to your kind notice, so that a scenario does not arise in the future, where the nation, the government of India, industry and trade are seen in a poor light,” the letter added.
India’s defence minister Manohar Parrikar was supposed to launch the phone, but did not turn up at the last moment.
#Freedom251 Chinese Smartphone. Whitener used to Hide Name. Sold in garb of Narendra Modi's "Make in India" campaign pic.twitter.com/BLAZPSBJWk
— Joy (@Joydas) February 18, 2016
Furthermore, a twitter user (@Joydas) pointed out in a tweet that the model of the handset presented at the launch was a rebranded version of the Chinese smartphone Adcom Icon 4, poorly disguised with a whitener pasted above the logo.
So in summary, is there truly a smartphone that can be priced as low as $4? What is your take?
