Lost-cost Phones Becoming a Reality
In a previous post, I talked about a low-cost $15 phone. The GSM Association promoted development of a mobile phone costing less than $30 with a contest. Motorola won, and is now developing phones for Bangladesh, China, India and Russia. Now GSM is pushing development of phones costing less than $15, which should speed global handset adoption even further.
Not all phones in developing countries will be low-end. Once developing countries have low-cost phones, companies will continue to upsell phones and services. According to an April 2005 IDC study, China will have nearly 100 million 3G subscribers by 2009.
Fifteen dollar cell phones are really pushing it, especially since cell phone batteries cost about $15 or so. I’ve actually considered buying one of those $20 tracefones or whatever they’re called just to get a battery and “charger” for some of my electronic projects.
[...] Bridging the digital divide. In the UK, there are more mobile phones than there are people. Yet 2/3 of the world’s population has no mobile phone and no access to the Internet. How can we connect them? Can the economic benefits of bridging this divide be used to solve their education and other social problems? How can we make mobile devices available to them at ultra low cost? By 2008, the cost should be below $15. (See post lost-cost-phones-becoming-a-reality.) [...]
[...] In several previous posts, I’ve commented about very low-cost mobile phones for the world. [...]