Tag: secret
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phones
/ In Depth: The secret of the £299 laptop - how do they do it?
Laptops are now a commodity item. A fully featured notebook for £299? Windows Vista Home Premium may not be common, but most £299 machines are extremely capable, with 1GB of memory and reasonable hard-drive sizes in many cases. So how do they do it? And can prices get any lower? Shahid Azeem, Managing Director of ArcomIT, doesn't think we'll get a £199 notebook any time soon. "Realistically, the amount of material and margin involved will not be possible to go to this," he explains. We spoke to a leading laptop vendor last year who expressed concern at the way the laptop market was going even then; saying the margin available was "very tight." And as far as reducing the price point further? "It's likely to bottom out." Margins are certainly getting less. "I suppose its difficult for manufacturers to keep bringing prices down when the technology is forever improving," says Brett Critchley, managing director of reseller Orchid. "Margins on laptops for VAR's (value-added reseller) such as us are very low, we are lucky to be able to make more than 4 per centon most makes." Azeem agrees. "Soon the margins will be so low the reseller would be lucky to make 2-3 per cent as box shifters," he says. Lost leaders and higher prices "Laptops at lower than £299 are not a sustainable market – you may see them as a loss leader or as a short term promotion," says What Laptop Editor Mike Browne. "Bargain laptops have their place – if you look at those being given away with mobile broadband tariffs, for instance. However, the prices of these laptops are being subsidised by the operators. No manufacturer can afford to offset the cost of the machine long term simply for market share."As Browne says, many manufacturers can only afford to sell laptops at £299 because they are loss leaders for retail or are sold on as last-generation stock. "In reality there aren't as many laptops at £299 as you'd think," he continues and points out that many companies are actually attempting to drive prices up, even more so since the advent of the netbook. "Manufacturers are aggressively pushing against this price point and trying to draw prices up,"adds Browne."We've already seen Samsung and Sony refusing to sell this cheap, for fear it will damage their brand, while the likes of Acer and Toshiba are also placing heavier focus on higher-specified machines." Indeed, Acer and Toshiba have been names associatedselling many laptops atthe £299 price point - many in retail promotions. Indeed, retail is one way in which future price drops may be engineered. Retailers – especially the UK's big guns – have immense power over market prices. >Loss of quality? And what of the netbook? >The only alternative is that we'll start to see a serious reduction in the quality of the notebooks we buy and use. Indeed, some think it's happening already. "Yes, the quality of laptops is suffering as the build quality has been cut considerably," continues Azeem. >But what about the hardware? How will it evolve over the coming months? "It's difficult to see where the boundaries of 'netbook' and 'laptop' are drawn now – below £300 or above? Flash drive or hard disk? Less than 10in screen or over," says Chris England, brand director of Ability p>It's also a question of whether the consumer is now sucked in by the netbook, too. "Dell has entered the field with their new netbook, the Inspiron Mini 9, at £299 – which is a 'premium' price for a netbook, and pushes up to the lower prices of the laptop sector," says England. "In our opinion, the definition of laptop [versus] netbooks doesn't directly interest consumers. If the current drive by mobile broadband retailers and operators turns netbooks into the top selling retail 'laptops' over the next year, as is likely, then consumers will be demonstrating their acceptance of the 'spec. /p>"Over time the specifications will improve and the perceived boundary between laptops and netbooks will disappear completely in the eyes of the consumer." A good point, but is it good for the laptop industry? Samsung is one of the companies that has admitted it is fearful of launching a netbook for fear of limiting sales of its full-blown laptops /p>Finding the balanceSo what about £299 as a 'sweet spot?' After all, the price point is all about the buyer: "It's really a case of pay your money and take your choice. You can't expect an all-singing all-dancing spec for £200," says Marketing Consultant and Sales Expert Sean McPhea /p>"Only at the weekend I was helping my mother-in-law to select a laptop at Staples and we found one that was £275. 'What do you need it for?' I asked and she said 'Just basic surfing, emailing and writing letters.' Why would she need a £500+ laptop when a £200 limited spec laptop will d /p>The £299 price point is, after all, satisfying an end of the market where people are buying laptops for very basic tasks. Interested in gaming and media, and you'll need to spend more. Interested in portability, you'll need to spend more. "The different price points depend on who the laptop is intended for and what they need it for," continues McPheat. "There are different price points for everything nowadays so it's a case of weighing up the price and the value you get for your money /p>Indeed, it's probably just the case that the £299 laptop is following every other commodity item. Whether it's a race to the bottom is, however, up for debat /p>Maybe we won't actually buy our laptops in the future. "From my point of view, the notebook in the future will be bundled in with a package such as Broadband/mobile and a notebook and you will just pay a monthly subscription fee," adds Azee /p>"Carphone Warehouse is already bundling an 18-month contract with broadband and a free notebook, and I'm sure we will see [many others] doing the same."
tags:
secret,
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news
/Tracy GardnerCatterson: the secret to an effective commission scheme
Former Carphone and Phones 4u MD speaks on incentives amid current changes.
tags:
secret,
from:
electronista
/ HP ships Voodoo Envy 133, secret project hinted at
HP on Tuesday announced it is shipping the Voodoo Envy 133 notebook, while Voodoo co-founder Rahul Sood alludes to a mystery product on the company's blog. CNET reveals that the MacBook Air and Lenovo X300 competitor saw an exclusive rollout event in...
from:
phones
/ Is this Sony Ericsson's secret new phone?
Pictures of a new Sony Ericsson Walkman phone have appeared, and it shows a slider phone in the same vein as the super-slim W880i. Those chaps over at the Unofficial Sony Ericsson Blog have uncovered the pic, and we're sorry to say there's very little we can report in terms of specs. Assumption, assumption We can assume GPS and an accelerometer, in the same vein as most of the other phones in the Walkman range, as well as some expanded storage. We're seeing a front facing camera, so that means 3.5G connectivity is pretty likely too. And given the level of camera packed into the Walkman range, 3.2MP would make sense. Actually, we've done pretty well here to get that many specs out of conjecture. Expect this to be released later this year, in time for the Christmas rush.
from:
iphone news
/ Free iPhone - Secret Trick to Get a Free iPhone,Legally!
http://FreeStore.phpnet.us The secret trick I used to get a FREE iPhone .Follow instructions in the video... apple iphone 16gb how to get iphone 16gb get free stuff for free apple iphone 16gb online gadget how to get free iphone apple ...
from:
theregister.co.uk
/ BT's secret Phorm trials: UK.gov responds
EU lawyers mull action Updated The European Commission is analysing the government's explanation of why UK authorites have taken no action over BT and Phorm's allegedly illegal broadband wiretapping and ad-targeting experiments in 2006 and 2007.…
from:
mobileshop-blog
/ Samsung M8800 Bresson - ultra-secret 8MP touchscreen mobile phone
Now, this is an interesting story, broken by one of the retailers we have on site, Phones4U. After all the searching for mobile phone news, it pops up on our own doorstep! It seems that very soon, Samsung are going to be launching a second 8 megapixel camera phone, to go with the already-released Samsung [...]
from:
mobileshop-blog
/ 5 megapixel mobile phone shootout - Samsung U900 Soul vs LG Secret Black
I hate it when I get grilled, in the pub, about mobile phones, especially, when I don’t yet know the answer they want. Occasionally, though, someone does ask an important question, that makes me go, “Ooh, I hadn’t thought of that.” So, a big thanks to the random bloke who asked me: Which is better? The [...]
from:
allthingsd.com
/ The Secret Microsoft Invasion of Yahoo Continues: MSN GM Headed There Soon?
Jeff Dossett, a longtime Microsoft exec whose most current job has been as executive producer and general manager of MSN, is leaving the company, sources said, and is likely to land at Yahoo soon. A longtime and experienced mountain climber, Dossett has been one of the more senior digital execs at Microsoft. It is an interesting digital-musical-chair trend, in fact. On Monday, another former Microsoft bigshot, Joanne Bradford, will start her job as Yahoo's top U.S. sales exec.
tags:
secret,
from:
mobile rainbow blog
/ Feature Comparison Of LG Secret And LG Viewty
LG today stands as one of the leading mobile manufacturing company. Its mobile phones are rated as the best in the entire mobile phone manufacturing fraternity. Prior to this LG was a market leader in the home appliance industry but as a part of the expansion policy when it entered into the mobile manufacturing industry [...]
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