3 ms·

I have bought unlocked, new Android phones for less than USD100 in the UK, so I'm not sure I believe that a USD150 phone on US T-mobile will only be a feature p

by com 14y ago

I have bought unlocked, new Android phones for less than USD100 in the UK, so I'm not sure I believe that a USD150 phone on US T-mobile will only be a feature phone. ZTE and Huawei are just the beginning of the wave of cheap smart phone providers that I expect to destroy the feature phone as a widely used device in the rich world in the coming years. Granted, the two phones I bought weren't very fast and had smaller screens, but they did have GPS, mobile data and ran all the apps that I tried from the Play store.

rogerbinns 14y ago
(BTW I'm a Brit living in the US). There are multiple issues in the US. * The vast majority of phones are sold by carriers due to the subsidy model. This leaves a considerably smaller market for the rest. Note the carriers chose which phones to carry - they will not provide arbitrary phones. Note this also applies even when someone like Amazon or Costco sell phones as they act as an agent for the carrier and the prices shown are the subsidised ones, and the phones are the carrier ones. * Because of that most consumers think phones already cost free/$100 or $200 for high end ones, and there is no incentive to buy a non-carrier phone since plans aren't any cheaper for a non-subsidised phone (with the exception of one type of plan on Tmobile and some of the pre-paid MVNOs). * Of the big 4 carriers (~85% of all mobile users) half have a CDMA legacy and half GSM, so those phones you bought could only work on 2 of the 4 carriers anyway * And even that wouldn't be enough. Many cheap GSM phones are tri-band. To work with voice in the US they need to be quad band (also support 850MHz). There are various issues with the data frequencies too (eg Tmobile's AWS band) and even differing LTE bands for newer/more expensive phones * If you care about coverage then you generally have to go with one of the big 3 (tmobile has notoriously poor coverage except in the most populated areas). If you use an MVNO then you are typically limited to the hosting carrier's network only. As an example I'm a tmobile subscriber, but in various areas a lot of their coverage is actually provided as a transparent roaming arrangement by AT&T - you don't see roaming on your phone. Similarly Verizon and Sprint have roaming in various places. But when using an MVNO you would using the native underlying carrier coverage only which will be a lot smaller footprint. * All phones have to pass the FCC certification which is added expense and time especially if your sales aren't going to be that high * People don't visit other countries as much (proportionally). You could fit the UK (including NI, Shetland, Jersey etc) in 2/3rds of California. Montana is the same size as Germany. This means a huge internal market with virtually no external influence or need for interoperability. That said the Canadian market is even more messed up than the US one. I don't know about Mexico. That said you can buy some cheap phones including below $100 - eg see Walmart http://goo.gl/yoABV http://goo.gl/yoABV but note they are usually locked to a prepaid carrier! This http://goo.gl/KiUje http://goo.gl/KiUje is what consumers usually see - the subsidised prices which get you better phones at "cheaper" prices.

by com 14y ago

rogerbinns 14y ago

(BTW I'm a Brit living in the US). There are multiple issues in the US. * The vast majority of phones are sold by carriers due to the subsidy model. This leaves a considerably smaller market for the rest. Note the carriers chose which phones to carry - they will not provide arbitrary phones. Note this also applies even when someone like Amazon or Costco sell phones as they act as an agent for the carrier and the prices shown are the subsidised ones, and the phones are the carrier ones. * Because of that most consumers think phones already cost free/$100 or $200 for high end ones, and there is no incentive to buy a non-carrier phone since plans aren't any cheaper for a non-subsidised phone (with the exception of one type of plan on Tmobile and some of the pre-paid MVNOs). * Of the big 4 carriers (~85% of all mobile users) half have a CDMA legacy and half GSM, so those phones you bought could only work on 2 of the 4 carriers anyway * And even that wouldn't be enough. Many cheap GSM phones are tri-band. To work with voice in the US they need to be quad band (also support 850MHz). There are various issues with the data frequencies too (eg Tmobile's AWS band) and even differing LTE bands for newer/more expensive phones * If you care about coverage then you generally have to go with one of the big 3 (tmobile has notoriously poor coverage except in the most populated areas). If you use an MVNO then you are typically limited to the hosting carrier's network only. As an example I'm a tmobile subscriber, but in various areas a lot of their coverage is actually provided as a transparent roaming arrangement by AT&T - you don't see roaming on your phone. Similarly Verizon and Sprint have roaming in various places. But when using an MVNO you would using the native underlying carrier coverage only which will be a lot smaller footprint. * All phones have to pass the FCC certification which is added expense and time especially if your sales aren't going to be that high * People don't visit other countries as much (proportionally). You could fit the UK (including NI, Shetland, Jersey etc) in 2/3rds of California. Montana is the same size as Germany. This means a huge internal market with virtually no external influence or need for interoperability. That said the Canadian market is even more messed up than the US one. I don't know about Mexico. That said you can buy some cheap phones including below $100 - eg see Walmart http://goo.gl/yoABV http://goo.gl/yoABV but note they are usually locked to a prepaid carrier! This http://goo.gl/KiUje http://goo.gl/KiUje is what consumers usually see - the subsidised prices which get you better phones at "cheaper" prices.