Is it a game of talent or simply game of making money??

Today from ‘want’, cell phones have become the ‘need’ of human beings. It has  become a part of our daily life. But many like me might have been surprised and frustrated when their smartphone disfunctions within a couple of months without using it much. The question is what is the lifespan of a smartphone? The answer is six to twelve months. That means whatever money one invests on a smart phone is just for a limited time period. So, one has to judicious invest in a smart phone keeping their budget and utility in mind. Probably, this is the reason why every company into manufacturing mobile phone devices, offers one year as the standard warranty.
 

Now the question is which phone brands to rely on? When about 60 to 70% of raw materials are imported from China, what is the difference between the popular brands like iPhone, Samsung, Lava, Oppo, Vivo, Xiaomi and others available in the market. If your phone survives for more than one year, then you are lucky enough, because the reason is very simple as the brands must be adjusting a mix of standard and sub-standard products in the phones. However, the expansive parts of a phone are the Motherboard, display, speaker, camera etc.
 

It is also a cruel fact that, some big brands discontinue their models very fast, even every year, and the reason behind this is a big question? No one tries to explore the fact behind this ….. The go-to-market strategy changes for each model, in terms of brand pushing. Hence, there has to be a mandate on the quality/grade of the products they are using has to be clearly mentioned in the brochure and booklet. It is all about Nexus amng the hardware,software companies present across the world.
 

It seems all the money we are spending in OEMs marketing efforts, branding and then comes look and feel. There is a competitive difference among any of the brands in terms of technolgy but yes there is difference in the features, however, iPhone has positioned as the premium brand, because it is an expensive affairs, all the Apple products are expensive. An expert says, there are various grades of BOMs available with the top ODMs in China and other countries, the prices depends upon OEMs/brand owners level of sourcing capacity. Whereas a BOM cost for making a smart phone is less then Rs.3500/-


We have seen many corporates discontinuing their mobile phone business in India  including LG, Sony, HTC, Blackberry, LeEco and Microsoft. There are many other smaller brands, which couldn’t stand a chance in the country. These names include YU, meizu, ZTE, Philips, Qiku, InFocus, Alcatel, Spice, iBall, Videocon, iVoomi, and Flipkart’s Billion, among others. The question is do you miss any of these brands? Answer hardly anyone bothers. …, but a person who is into a limited income bracket, definitely bothers. Industry experts quote that certain mobile phone brands come to India for the shopping.
 

Let’s look into how  the major brands have discontinued their models just after one year of the launch.
 

the reason I am alerting, after discontinuing the models, getting the spare parts of that model phone becomes very expensive and you are not sure whether it’ll function like the original phone. The service centre offers a warranty for just a limited time period. Hence, one will get frustrated and opts for a new phone. So, at the end of the day, who is at loss and who is at gain? The answer is the investors are at stake whereas the brand owners, who-so-ever it is, are in the green patch and flourishing.
 

Today, making a mobile phone is not a big job, so what will happen to the technology giants who have invested into the brand building. It is like muscleman’s theory. If you have a lot of money for spending on the marketing and roping in the celebrities or so called influencers and the reviews are done by the paid personalities, you can definitely win the race.
 

It is advised to judge before you budge while going for a smartphone.