Thứ Bảy, 25 tháng 6, 2016
Chances are, if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. That seemed to be the case for the Freedom 251, the world's cheapest smartphone, announced in February. Ringing Bells, the Indian company behind the phone, sparked controversy when it claimed the smartphone would sell for just $4. Naturally, people were very curious to know how the company could sell an Android smartphone for so little, prompting the Indian Cellular Association (ICA) to write to India's telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad to get some hard answers. The ICA also accused Ringing Bells of potentially fraudulent claims saying even the cheapest build-of-materials would cost about $40 for a phone with barebone specs such as Android 5.1, a 4-inch screen, 1.3GHz quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of internal storage, 1,450 mAh battery, and a 3.2-megapixel back and 0.3-megapixel front camera. Furthermore, there was no clear wireless carrier backing the $4 phone and providing subsidies on it to offer savings to customers. The company is losing money on every unit sold, but the goal is to allow rural and poor Indians to access the digital world. Just when things couldn't get any worse, it was discovered that the Freedom 251 was actually an illegally rebadged version of China's Adcom Ikon 4, which sells for about $54. Oh, and the app icons were basically ripped right off iOS. During investigation, Mohit Goel, Ringing Bells's Managing Director, remained unfazed. "We remain committed to cooperating with any government agency that may require inquiring our organisation for any reason or suspicion," Goel said. "I do maintain that we will deliver the most-affordable quality products to our customers through our various range of smartphones, including the Freedom 251." Fast forward a couple of months and 70 million registrations for the device later and Ringing Bells is finally gearing up to ship the first $4 Freedom 251 phones to customers on June 30, according to IANS. "We learned from our mistakes and decided to go silent till we come out with the product. Now we have a 4-inch, dual-SIM phone ready for delivery. I feel vindicated," Goel told IANS. Goel says the company is losing money on every unit sold, but the goal is to allow rural and poor Indians to access the digital world. The phone's specs have also been updated since the original version was announced. The rear camera's a higher resolution 8-megapixel shooter and the selfie camera is a 3.2-megapixel shooter. There's also a larger 1,800 mAh battery. The phone will be available in black and white. The rest of the specs are the same as the original: 4-inch screen, 1.3GHz quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage. The company plans to fulfill 2.5 million orders by the end of the month and ship 200,000 units per month afterwards. It remains to be seen how well a $4 smartphone will function. The Freedom 251 may seem extremely underpowered if you're used to flagship performance devices, but consider this: It has better specs than even the original iPhone when it was released nine years ago, and that was originally sold for $599. Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.
Thứ Năm, 28 tháng 4, 2016
After the much-hyped Freedom 251, the world’s cheapest phone priced at Rs 251 ($3.78), another Indian Android smartphone called the Docoss X1 is making news with its unbelievably low price of Rs 888 ($13.3). Yet, like its predecessor Freedom 251, Docoss X1 has raised suspicions of being yet another scam by an unknown company to make some quick money. After a high-profile launch in February and receiving over 73.5 million bookings, Freedom 251 makers' claims soon unravelled into charges of fraud and financial irregularities. Like Freedom 251’s parent company Ringing Bells, Docoss X1 is being manufactured by a relatively new and unknown company from Jaipur. This is also its first phone, with no mention of any other product in the portfolio. Instead of off-the-shelf sales, customers can only pre-book the phone on its website and via SMS until Apr. 29 with the option of cash-on-delivery. The company also claims to deliver the smartphone from May 2. While the Docoss website has been crashing due to heavy traffic, several buyers have complained that its customer care numbers weren’t working either. Calls made to the company's phone number mentioned on the website also went unanswered. Apart from 3G support, the dual-SIM smartphone has hardware that's at least three years old. The Docoss X1 has a 4-inch IPS display, a 2-megapixel rear camera, VGA front camera, and a 1,300 mAh battery. It runs on Android KitKat 4.4, and is powered by a 1.3GHz Cortex-A7 dual core processor and 1GB RAM. It also has 4GB internal storage, which can be increased to 32GB with a microSD card. The interest generated by Freedom 251 and Docoss X1 indicates the immense demand for low-budget smartphones in India. The country is the world’s second-largest and one of its fastest-growing smartphone markets, but with a large customer base with low purchasing power. This is where it becomes easy for companies like Ringing Bells and Docoss Multimedia to lure unsuspecting customers with low-end devices. The troubles faced by Docoss have echoes of Freedom 251. The $3 smartphone had raised doubts over its low pricing, even though it had specifications and components that were considerably more than its selling price. Its website faced recurrent glitches after heavy traffic, and the handset prototypes revealed during its launch were from another Indian company Adcom, covered with white paint. Adcom later revealed that it had sold the handsets to Ringing Bells at Rs 3,600 ($54). Ringing Bells was soon facing allegations of fraud. The company is currently embroiled in trial over charges of cheating, placing misleading advertisements and collecting money through a ponzi scheme. This is in addition to a government investigation over breaching the Foreign Exchange Management Act. Amidst growing criticism, the company announced that it would refund the entire Rs 840 million collected from pre-bookings and opt for cash-on-delivery instead. The smartphones are yet to be delivered. Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.
