Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
SNIP On the other hand... Go take a look at all of the ~$100 wireless router/firewall/print server/gateway boxes on the market, and you'll see one thing that almost all of them have in common: they all run Linux. Most of them are even based on the same small number of tools; things like busybox and uclibc. If you want to see cheap, powerful VoIP phones, think about what they really need in terms of software, and then set out to write it and license it so the phone companies can incorporate it into their products. I'm kind of amazed that FXS ports aren't standard on medium-end home routers right now; they'd probably only add $5-10 to the cost of the router, *IF* they had the software and felt like the demand was there. My Draytek ADSL 2600v comes with two FXS ports ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
On 16/06/2004 at 22:53 Jay Milk wrote: You're correct -- I believe I pointed out in my original post that there is a $200+ difference between a cordless Cisco with/without software. And that's plain ridiculous. Plus, the phone alone isn't worth $500 in hardware -- so we're obviously dealing with GREED here. My knee-jerk response to such business tactics always has been to do it better and cheaper. Six years ago, I was talking to IT personel in industry X. There were two established mainframe solutions in that industry serving 80% of the market, costing $50K-$75K start-up cost per location, plus $1K+ per seat. Never mind the $10K-$15K monthly maintenance cost. Never mind that everyone had to be able to work a terminal with a lovely amber on black, text-based GUI. snip for brevity I think you're missing the point. When you develop hardware or software you need to recoup the cost of development (the period in which you aren't selling anything, so not making any money). Now Cisco has it's fingers in many pies so they aren't going to suffer to much from that now, but they do have to fund development. Secondly, Cisco don't really care if their phones are out of your price range, they are typically sold as part of a solution costing 10's of 1000's or 100's of 1000's of USD/GBP/EUR and (most probably) with big discounts. Thirdly, If I make a device at a cost of $5 and sell it for $500, some people will buy it, up to the point where someone builds a similar device and sells it for $150 ...You have a choice. companies are not charities, they do this to make money. This is what we call capitalism. I don't want to dig at your business, and this isn't intended to but.. what you did is look at what was already on offer and it's costs, how it worked etc and built a cheaper solution. The reason you could do this is because you had the exposure to the 'system' as was.. i.e. You looked at it and said 'I can do that cheaper' but without that original system you probably wouldn't have. One final point... There are some companies that have this weird feeling that anything under a certain amount must be cheap and nasty and not work properly. These people are fools imho, but they do exist...and they wont buy an cheap phone, they'll buy an expensive phone, regardless of it's ability... as we've seen recently some governments will even buy helicopters that can't fly in fog or where it's sandy for silly money... Now I feel dirty... Andy ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
I don't think I was missing the point. Hardware and software development are very much the same -- In my original proposal, I suggested a type of communal development -- engineers would receive a share of the company proportional to the time they donated. I have done this type of development on several projects before, and have always more than recouped my initial investment. Consider it open-source with a business plan. However, in addition to development cost, hardware carries a high up-front cost for the first production run, while software has virtually no media cost. Secondly, I didn't consider what you wrote a dig at my business, since you misread my first post: I didn't say I can do this cheaper, I said I can do this cheaper AND BETTER. Our software provides the same core functionalty as the legacy systems, but presents that functionality in a manner that is much more user-friendly. Above that, we add about 200% more functionality than the legacy systems. Would we have done this without the existing systems? Probably, as the need was for a usable front-end with some added functionality; we just chose to include core functionality. I feel this is getting off-topic... Sorry. -Original Message- From: Andy Powell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, June 17, 2004 3:34 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software? On 16/06/2004 at 22:53 Jay Milk wrote: You're correct -- I believe I pointed out in my original post that there is a $200+ difference between a cordless Cisco with/without software. And that's plain ridiculous. Plus, the phone alone isn't worth $500 in hardware -- so we're obviously dealing with GREED here. My knee-jerk response to such business tactics always has been to do it better and cheaper. Six years ago, I was talking to IT personel in industry X. There were two established mainframe solutions in that industry serving 80% of the market, costing $50K-$75K start-up cost per location, plus $1K+ per seat. Never mind the $10K-$15K monthly maintenance cost. Never mind that everyone had to be able to work a terminal with a lovely amber on black, text-based GUI. snip for brevity I think you're missing the point. When you develop hardware or software you need to recoup the cost of development (the period in which you aren't selling anything, so not making any money). Now Cisco has it's fingers in many pies so they aren't going to suffer to much from that now, but they do have to fund development. Secondly, Cisco don't really care if their phones are out of your price range, they are typically sold as part of a solution costing 10's of 1000's or 100's of 1000's of USD/GBP/EUR and (most probably) with big discounts. Thirdly, If I make a device at a cost of $5 and sell it for $500, some people will buy it, up to the point where someone builds a similar device and sells it for $150 ...You have a choice. companies are not charities, they do this to make money. This is what we call capitalism. I don't want to dig at your business, and this isn't intended to but.. what you did is look at what was already on offer and it's costs, how it worked etc and built a cheaper solution. The reason you could do this is because you had the exposure to the 'system' as was.. i.e. You looked at it and said 'I can do that cheaper' but without that original system you probably wouldn't have. One final point... There are some companies that have this weird feeling that anything under a certain amount must be cheap and nasty and not work properly. These people are fools imho, but they do exist...and they wont buy an cheap phone, they'll buy an expensive phone, regardless of it's ability... as we've seen recently some governments will even buy helicopters that can't fly in fog or where it's sandy for silly money... Now I feel dirty... Andy ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/aster isk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
On Thu, 2004-06-17 at 04:45, Michael Sandee wrote: Am I dreaming? Yes. Community based development is too unreliable. Just to refer to ongoing projects... Look at the farfon (www.farfon.com), It's an active project in the final stages of development. It offers the benefits (modular, programming of your own features, quality components, low price, corporate backing, designed by skilled engineers...) without the negative sides of your plan. Speaking of which, does anyone know the real/current status of this project. Every time I look at their website, it hasn't changed... I for one would love to be buying a few of their phones for testing, followed by more for roll-out's Regards, Adam ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Just to get an idea of hardware cost involved here: - I can buy a 4-port router with built-in firewall, web-server and email-client for $20-$30 RETAIL. That would indicate a hardware cost of $10 max. - I can purchase a Sipura SPA-2000 for $100 -- actual hardware cost should be $50-$75. SPA 2000 hardware cost is much less then that!!! - I can also purchase a fully featured ADSI speakerphone for $80 retail, with an expected hardware cost of $50-$60. Same here... Combine all these pieces for hardware cost of $110-$145 -- I'd think that synergies would push hardware cost under $100 -- and you have all the hardware required to build at least a 2-line IP speakerphone with a nice large display, webserver for config, and enough processing power to run some advanced functionality. You could even add one of the Yamaha sound-chips for downloadable ringtones if you so desire. Well.. It still depends of what cup, dsp etc are included.. The 2-line restriction would be purely theoretical, allowing for 4, 6, or even 12 lines to be registered (who really needs more than 3 or 4?). The device could be well documented, opening the door/port for open-source software. Does this sound to utopian, or do my fellow list-members think there is an idea here? How many more PBXs would you integrators sell if the cost was down to $150/station for a business-class phone? This is a certainly a question needing an answer! However, lets see if anyone will actually do so? How many more features could be implemented with an open-source UA? (Menus, Visual Voicemail, extended CallerID info, Call Delegation, Queue handling, Email, Weather, Reminders, ) If it too complicated.. End users may be reluctant to buy it! Could this be profitable? - You bet, I'd guess you could sell a few 100,000 of these devices in the next three years. The design would be open, but protected from clones by virtue copyright law (bootloader and operating system could be proteges). A public company would own the design and contract with a manufacturer. Well.. This is REAL problem.. I am sure that a lot of people on this list have similar ideas to yours. It would be very nice if we all could get together to produce a solution like this... However, time will tell! Could this be financed? - I don't think it would take that much -- maybe $10K - $20K to purchase samples and development hardware and software. Engineers could donate time in exchange for revenue shares later. A small investment would be counted toward a purchase of a finished product, a large investment would buy you a share in the company. 200 active members in this list donating $100 each could get a handful of engineers on their way. Well, said... $100 each would take project to somewhere.. However, the costs may spiral out of control! Where do we get the know-how? - Partner with existing companies like Digium and Sipura. Once the project is complete, they would receive revenue shares and/or utilize their manufacturing resources. Yes, that would be good way... But what then? Who owns it? Who profits from it... A lot of questions needing an answer! Am I dreaming? No, you are not dreaming! It can be done! One just needs to find correct way! I personally would love to see a very low cost embedded board running *, with FXS/FXO port on it! ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Am I dreaming? Yes. Community based development is too unreliable. Just to refer to ongoing projects... Look at the farfon (www.farfon.com), It's an active project in the final stages of development. It offers the benefits (modular, programming of your own features, quality components, low price, corporate backing, designed by skilled engineers...) without the negative sides of your plan. ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
At 1:18 PM -0500 on 6/16/04, Jay Milk wrote: I took a little foray into pricing out IP Phones for my home pbx yesterday. $75-$750 seems to be quite a range, so I took a closer look. [snip] Am I dreaming? Well, yes, you're sort-of dreaming. The trick is not designing the hardware or the software - anyone with $100k (or much, much less) and the right engineers can get something working to the point where it is ready to be produced. You will hit the wall with: - finding reliable suppliers of manufacturing technology - finding enough money for cash float during the sales cycle - finding enough money for marketing float during sales cycle - finding adequate sales channels - compensating your sales channels The last two are the most important. These are not engineering questions; they are business and political questions, which is why the hardware market looks so easy but is so littered with the dead husks of failed companies run by engineers. Selling direct is a limited market; there are only so many Asterisk home users that you can advertise to via the mailing lists. :-) JT ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
On Jun 16, 2004, at 11:18 AM, Jay Milk wrote: Cisco, for example, has different models such as the 7940 and 7960 which seem to only differ in the software. IIRC, the 7940 and 7960 run the same software, but differ slightly in hardware. The 60 has 6 line appearance buttons, while the 40 has 2. I'm not sure quite how they manage to charge $25/button for the upgrade. :-) Does this sound to utopian, or do my fellow list-members think there is an idea here? How many more PBXs would you integrators sell if the cost was down to $150/station for a business-class phone? How many more features could be implemented with an open-source UA? (Menus, Visual Voicemail, extended CallerID info, Call Delegation, Queue handling, Email, Weather, Reminders, ) Well, the big problem with all of this is the development costs. Your $30 router is probably the 5th or 6th nearly-identical product the company has made, and they've probably sold millions of them. I doubt most VoIP phone vendors sell more then 100,000 of even their most popular models, and phone vendors are just starting to be able to share platform code between models. Odds are, we'll see the phone that you're looking for, but it'll take another three years to show up, and it'll probably come from the same companies that make your cheap routers and cordless phones today--D-Link, Linksys, VTech, Panasonic, and whoever OEMs the home phones that ATT and SBC sell by the boatload. It'll take a while for commodity VoIP phones to appear. I mean, even 12 months ago, it wasn't completely clear that SIP was going to win. And you can't have commodity hardware without ubiquitous standards. Could this be financed? - I don't think it would take that much -- maybe $10K - $20K to purchase samples and development hardware and software. Engineers could donate time in exchange for revenue shares later. A small investment would be counted toward a purchase of a finished product, a large investment would buy you a share in the company. 200 active members in this list donating $100 each could get a handful of engineers on their way. My gut instincts say that you're low by at least an order of magnitude. The hard part isn't really designing the basic code. The hard part is building the user interface and doing all of the design work. I mean, go take a look at really good consumer electronics devices (TiVo comes to mind). Spend some time looking at how well they work, and then compare them to even the best OS interfaces (KDE?). You can't really design good interfaces by committee. On the other hand... Go take a look at all of the ~$100 wireless router/firewall/print server/gateway boxes on the market, and you'll see one thing that almost all of them have in common: they all run Linux. Most of them are even based on the same small number of tools; things like busybox and uclibc. If you want to see cheap, powerful VoIP phones, think about what they really need in terms of software, and then set out to write it and license it so the phone companies can incorporate it into their products. I'm kind of amazed that FXS ports aren't standard on medium-end home routers right now; they'd probably only add $5-10 to the cost of the router, *IF* they had the software and felt like the demand was there. Scott ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
John Todd wrote: failed companies run by engineers. Selling direct is a limited market; there are only so many Asterisk home users that you can advertise to via the mailing lists. :-) I think there are enough of us resellers/consultants around here to make a very viable business for a decent phone product; if the Virbiage FT102 IAX phone was available (and reliable) right now at the price listed on their web site, I could sell 50 in the next week, and plenty more after that. Same goes for the Sayson 480i, although it's a little more expensive, it's still a far better product (or will be :-)) than anything else at or below its price. If it was available, I'd be selling them immediately. As it stands today, the least expensive multi-line appearance SIP or IAX phone available in the US is the Polycom SoundPoint IP 500, which is a nice phone, but not cheap ($240 or so), and Polycom doesn't really cater to those of us who aren't buying from their solution providers. There is a _huge_ market for a decent, 2/4 line appearance business class SIP/IAX phone (with G.729 support) for under $200US, and whoever gets there first is going to have a quick return on their efforts. ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Well, yes, you're sort-of dreaming. The trick is not designing the hardware or the software - anyone with $100k (or much, much less) and the right engineers can get something working to the point where it is ready to be produced. You will hit the wall with: - finding reliable suppliers of manufacturing technology - finding enough money for cash float during the sales cycle - finding enough money for marketing float during sales cycle These two points are sticking points with investors of ANY type (banks, venture, angels). They don't like giving working capital out, because there's nothing to show for it, or if you go belly up, there's nothing to re-possess and sell. - finding adequate sales channels - compensating your sales channels ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Well if you just take a look at the sand that is needed to make the chips you even get better prices... Sand -- silicon -- chips -- PCB -- phone -- a lot of talking It's not the material of the phone, it's the payroll of the people who make the -- happen.-) Never mind my rude simplification, CS -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:asterisk-users- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Michael Sandee Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 2004 8:45 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software? Am I dreaming? Yes. Community based development is too unreliable. Just to refer to ongoing projects... Look at the farfon (www.farfon.com), It's an active project in the final stages of development. It offers the benefits (modular, programming of your own features, quality components, low price, corporate backing, designed by skilled engineers...) without the negative sides of your plan. ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:asterisk-users- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Michael Sandee Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 2004 8:45 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software? Am I dreaming? Firstly one would have to wonder if Digium will be taking the next step to produce a handset based on their, yet to be released, IAXy. The IAXy appears to be a possible core just add the keypad and handset. Secondly IF a device could be built there MAY be business models that wouldn't need centralised sales and marketing budgets. For example many people on this list are running VOIP businesses where it MAY make sense to give CHEAP handsets away in order to gain subscribers and then recoup the costs from call or subscription fees. Thirdly what sort of expertise would the group be able to pull together? Software seems to be the main competency and hardware is a different kettle of fish. That being said these days a lot of consumer hardware is going the way of reference designs (broadcom and WiFi routers for example) with OEMs differentiating on the software or even just the user interface. IF a good hardware reference design was available for a VOIP handset software would POSSIBLY become the primary task and therefore POSSIBLY suit the expertise of this group... Regards, Aaron __ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Hi Just to get an idea of hardware cost involved here: - I can buy a 4-port router with built-in firewall, web-server and email-client for $20-$30 RETAIL. That would indicate a hardware cost of $10 max. - I can purchase a Sipura SPA-2000 for $100 -- actual hardware cost should be $50-$75. - I can also purchase a fully featured ADSI speakerphone for $80 retail, with an expected hardware cost of $50-$60. But you fail to discuss the most important fact. Cisco charge USD 500 for a phone simply because they can do so :) If you look at the general pricing - go back 2 years and you could hardly find a VoIP phone for less than USD 250. Enter Grandstream and prices started dropping. When Grandstream first appeared they listed the price as USD 79. Now they are generally selling at around USD 50-60 or so (single pcs. end user pricing. It's now possible to get a lot of IP phones for less than USD 100 - which is about the price that I and most people find reasonable to pay for them. You see the same with the WiFi phones right now. The first Cisco one was what - 6-700 USD (I never even bothered to check the exact price). The second one - the ZyXEL/Pulver thingy - well - they generally seem to sell now at around USD 200 or so. The Senao one is going to hit the market in a few month and they claim to target around USD 120 for the initial offering. I'll bet you anything that shortly after the ZyXEL's will be around USD 100 and they'll both end up competing around that level. Anyway - I'm babbling now :) My point was only that the price of these gadgets have next to nothing to do with the actual hardware cost - but is only controlled by what the market is prepared to pay. Regards, Lars... ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
You're correct -- I believe I pointed out in my original post that there is a $200+ difference between a cordless Cisco with/without software. And that's plain ridiculous. Plus, the phone alone isn't worth $500 in hardware -- so we're obviously dealing with GREED here. My knee-jerk response to such business tactics always has been to do it better and cheaper. Six years ago, I was talking to IT personel in industry X. There were two established mainframe solutions in that industry serving 80% of the market, costing $50K-$75K start-up cost per location, plus $1K+ per seat. Never mind the $10K-$15K monthly maintenance cost. Never mind that everyone had to be able to work a terminal with a lovely amber on black, text-based GUI. In response, we set out to write a better application, using a relational DB, Windows GUI, etc. We now have installed over 600 locations nationwide (capturing almost 16% market share), offering a much better solution at a lower cost. Our company employs some 20 programmers, 40 support and 20 training staff, and we're greatly profitable. Cisco would be smart to drop the prices of their phones to realistic levels -- if their phones cost $200 instead of $400, they would probably only make $100/phone, but they'd sell disproportionally more phones to balance this out. On the other hand, they'd really P.O. their current customers who paid their inflated prices. Sucks to be them. So, reading all the great feedback on this, what if we took an open-source SIP phone (Siphon, KPhone), figure out the least amount of hardware to run it, configure a PC104 or other SBC prototype and then show it to investors. Heck, I think I may just try this out sometime... $400 buys me a 5.25 sized miniboard with Dual-Lan, onboard Audio, usb, serial, CF port (for disk-on-chip), etc. Another $100 gets me a serial LCD, and for $2.50 I can pick up parts to adapt a telephone handset to the sound-card's impedance. It would seem that this is the complete deal. Part cost for prototype: Less than $1K. Software is GPL'd. Then I'd have an actual prototype to show the banks and pass off to product engineering team. Software can remain open source, and the hardware is nothing more than a very specialized PC with built-in UA and handset. BTW, where can you get the Grandstream for $50? That's a decent alternative to having Sipuras and analog phones everywhere in this house. -Original Message- From: Lars Boegild Thomsen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 2004 8:25 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software? Hi Just to get an idea of hardware cost involved here: - I can buy a 4-port router with built-in firewall, web-server and email-client for $20-$30 RETAIL. That would indicate a hardware cost of $10 max. - I can purchase a Sipura SPA-2000 for $100 -- actual hardware cost should be $50-$75. - I can also purchase a fully featured ADSI speakerphone for $80 retail, with an expected hardware cost of $50-$60. But you fail to discuss the most important fact. Cisco charge USD 500 for a phone simply because they can do so :) If you look at the general pricing - go back 2 years and you could hardly find a VoIP phone for less than USD 250. Enter Grandstream and prices started dropping. When Grandstream first appeared they listed the price as USD 79. Now they are generally selling at around USD 50-60 or so (single pcs. end user pricing. It's now possible to get a lot of IP phones for less than USD 100 - which is about the price that I and most people find reasonable to pay for them. You see the same with the WiFi phones right now. The first Cisco one was what - 6-700 USD (I never even bothered to check the exact price). The second one - the ZyXEL/Pulver thingy - well - they generally seem to sell now at around USD 200 or so. The Senao one is going to hit the market in a few month and they claim to target around USD 120 for the initial offering. I'll bet you anything that shortly after the ZyXEL's will be around USD 100 and they'll both end up competing around that level. Anyway - I'm babbling now :) My point was only that the price of these gadgets have next to nothing to do with the actual hardware cost - but is only controlled by what the market is prepared to pay. Regards, Lars... ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
RE: [Asterisk-Users] Cost of IP Phones, or Isn't It Just Software?
Hi, Getting off-topic on the list - so let's do this in email instead. And that's plain ridiculous. Plus, the phone alone isn't worth $500 in hardware -- so we're obviously dealing with GREED here. Well, that's what most public listed companies are driven by. much better solution at a lower cost. Our company employs some 20 programmers, 40 support and 20 training staff, and we're greatly profitable. In other words - you charge what the market is prepared to pay, but still enough to make a lot of money. Don't get me wrong - I fully understand that but I fail to see the difference between that and Cisco's model :) Cisco would be smart to drop the prices of their phones to realistic levels I never worked for Cisco but I worked with one of their international partners and I actually borroed a desk at one of the cisco office for more than 2 years so I've got pretty intimite knowledge of their business model. First of all - trust me - Cisco know exactly what they are doing. They never try to compete at the low-end stuff. If they want to move into that field they buy another company and keep their brand for the purpose (example: linksys). They deliberately profile their own stuff as market technology leader and nothing less. Also Cisco don't really care or bother about end-users. They prefer large accounts and deliberately put their prices so high they won't be bothered by end-users and got PLENTY of margin to provide for resellers, distributors and give heavy discounts to their large accounts. I never worked with a company that will go to more extreme measures to get a deal than Cisco. To quote one of my friends - who is an account manager in Cisco - once when I asked him for a rediculous low price for a Cisco device: Cisco NEVER say NO to a deal. In other words - if Cisco want a business they'll shoot out the phones at whatever price it takes to get that deal. -- if their phones cost $200 instead of $400, they would probably only make $100/phone, but they'd sell disproportionally more phones to balance this out. On the other hand, they'd really P.O. their current customers who paid their inflated prices. Sucks to be them. Cisco are doing ok profit wise - so they must be doing something right - whether you like it or not is another matter :) So, reading all the great feedback on this, what if we took an open-source SIP phone (Siphon, KPhone), figure out the least amount of hardware to run it, configure a PC104 or other SBC prototype and then show it to investors. Heck, I think I may just try this out sometime... Well - I live in south-east asia and I'll be happy to help you find cheap manufacturing of these devices if you find a way to finance it. It is entirely possible but you'll be facing the same problems as everybody else that tries this. I met the founder of Snom a couple of years back and their problem is a good illustration of this. They knew they had a great product which was manufactured in Germany. They also knew that in order to make money on this they needed to do mass production in some cheap Asian country. But they were not able to finance the more than 90 days it took between where they had to pay up for doing this production run to when they were able to get their money back. So - they are still doing shitsmall production runs and probably still do at least the assembly in Germany - which is why they have to charge USD 200++ for something that would have cost them less than USD 40 to manufacture out here - that is if they were able to make 100.000 devices at the time. deal. Part cost for prototype: Less than $1K. Software is GPL'd. Then I'd have an actual prototype to show the banks Been there - done that - the bank won't even bother to look at your prototype. They don't give a f*ck. What they want to see is how you plan to get the investment back - that's the only thing they care about - and your challenge is to find a way to convince them, and that ain't easy without a track record (meaning existing customers - which you don't have if you only have a prototype). Say Catch-22 :) BTW, where can you get the Grandstream for $50? That's a decent alternative to having Sipuras and analog phones everywhere in this house. Well - end-user price out here is around USD 60 if you buy ONE right now. If you buy a hundred or so you'll get them down to that price. Regards, Lars... -- Lars Boegild Thomsen Technical Director JustIT Sdn. Bhd. Cell Phone (MY): +60 (16) 323 1999 ICQ: 6478559 Yahoo Chat: [EMAIL PROTECTED] MSN Chat: [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.justit.ws Phone: +1 (360) 515 3551 (US) +45 8692 1951 (DK) +60 (3) 2057 2646 (MY) Fax : +60 (3) 2057 2647 (MY) ___ Asterisk-Users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users
