Just a question, why the Fairphone is so expensive?
Well, I can’t give you a proper answer, but I’d turn the question around: Why are many other smartphones so cheap? This cost breakdown may in deciding what the correct answer is: https://www.fairphone.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Fairphone2-Cost-Breakdown.pdf. I believe the answer is that being fair, doing things right, has a cost. It could be compared to fair trade fruit which tend to be more expensive than regular fruit. The price difference feels much more when it’s in the range of hundreds of euros.
Of course it’s also about economies of scale. A small company can’t produce low volumes of devices as cheaply as a large company can produce large quantities. And then there’s the fact that Fairphone is doing much more than just produce a device. The blog contains many articles about the work they’re doing in the different parts of supply chain. Yet another thing is that a small company in an early stage can’t subsidize development of new devices with the revenue from previous ones. There’s also the issue about using investors’ money as that might affect the direction of the company.
I’m sure there are many other reasons, and maybe not everyone agrees on these points, but these are the ones that come to my mind and I believe to be correct.
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