A Mobile Phone for $14 (fourteen!!) ?
Written on Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela, has announced that the Venezuelan government has teamed up with a firm to create a $14 phone complete with MP3 playback, FM Radio, and a camera. Called El Vergatario, the handset should launch in May.We dug around a bit, but we’re having a hard time figuring out exactly what El Vergatario means in this context. It seems that Vergatario is everything from slang for “Great” to a few things that are, as Wired points out, a bit more offensive.
We’re still a bit torn on this one. The good side: Cheap cell phones for people who otherwise couldn’t get them. The bad side: Chances are, these things won’t be very ecologically friendly. Cheap phones means lots of phones sold, which means lots of phones in land fills within 4-5 years.
Hugo Chavez is indeed a controversial figure, and with moves like this, how could he not be? From a mobile marketing point of view this is certainly excellent news. And I'm sure people in Venezuela who will benefit from the scheme also share this view.
Personally, I can't say I share the views in the article regarding the phone's friendliness to the environment -- just because it's cheap doesn't mean it can't be green! The Venezuelan president has certainly proven in the past that he can break stereotypes. Why not also this one?
We'll just have to wait and see how much it will eventually cost, if the figures are eventually announced.
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mobile entertainment,
mobile marketing
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El Vergatario is not the only cheap phone in the market. India has its own. It's called 'the people's phone' and costs around 10 pounds as you can read at the Times Online
India has already built the world's cheapest car – the £1,250 Tata Nano – now the country has unveiled the telecoms equivalent: the £10 "people's phone".
The mobile handset, developed by Spice, the Indian telecoms group that is listed in Bombay and worth £1 billion, is angled at the very lowest end of the market.
This means the phone has jettisoned all "non-essential" features – such as a screen. "It is just a phone," said Bhupendra Kumar Modi, the Spice chairman, who hopes to sell about 10 million in the next year.