The Indian Market has tremendous appetite for Low Cost yet feature filled SmartPhones/ Tablets as consumers search value for money thus giving an opportunity for new class of whitebox tablets expands the global market into a new entry level tier of products for emerging markets. The whitebox tablet ecosystem began coming together in 2010 as digital photo frame and MP4 makers began adding features to their products with early versions of Android 2.x. The early devices had limited traction due to still buggy software and inadequate communication features.
Last year, we have seen an inflection point in this market with the introduction of Android 4.0, a release that standardised applications across smartphones and tablets and brought Android’s more successful ecosystem into the tablet market. ARM provided the shot in the arm by lowering the entry barrier for chip companies to enable low-cost computing, allowing multiple Chinese IC design companies to reach over 1 GHz single and dual-core products with GPU cores capable of processing multimedia video and games.
The Economics of Manufacturing Low Cost White Box Tablet
It is typically made of touch-enabled screens ranging from 7” to 10”, powered by Android, equipped with WiFi or 3G connectivity, and retailing between US$50 and US$200. Within the US$50-100 price range, a 7-inch entry level WiFi only starts from US$53 in 5,000+ quantities or US$85 with 3G , US$110 with higher resolution IPS display and 3G and Mediatek dual-core chipset.
The Bill of Material and manufacturing cost of an entry level whitebox tablet (7” low-resolution, low-end single-core processor) is typically US$40, mid-range at US$100 (10” low-resolution, dual-core processor), and high-end with 10” (10” high resolution, high-end dual-core) at US$150. Pricing of key components such as flash memory, DRAM, and touch display panel are the key factors.
The following chart Shows the Bill of material Comparison of Whitebox Tablet vs Samsung Galaxy vs iPad Mini vs Google nexus Tablets 