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The Future of Subnotebook Pricing

Posted by Soulskill on from the cheap-things-come-to-those-who-wait dept.

Corpuscavernosa recommends a story from InternetNews about the development of the subnotebook market. The author notes the beginnings of a trend toward selling the devices bundled with certain services rather than as standalone products. He notes two examples; a free Asus Eee PC with a broadband package, and another for opening a bank account. Quoting: "Soon, the market will be overwhelmed by what I like to call 'mini me too' laptops -- commodity Asus clones that will drive margins for all players toward zero. There will be no real money to be made in direct sales of cheap mini-notebooks to consumers. I'm predicting that the successful pricing model for 'mini me too' laptops will look nothing like the notebook pricing model (where you always pay full price for the hardware), and a lot like the cell phone pricing model where you buy a service, and the hardware is heavily subsidized or given away free."

3 of 145 comments (clear)

  1. Calculator Redux? by MSTCrow5429 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've read that in the 70s, 4-function calculators went from high-margin, luxury items to throw-away promotional items. The only calculators I've bought are a financial calculator, and a scientific calculator for basic statistics; all of my other calculators are freebies. It took a bit longer, perhaps as the product is far more complex, but are we seeing the same ultra-commoditization of mobile computing devices?

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  2. Re:Subnotebooks like Cell phone plans? by KokorHekkus · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Just grabbed one of the many junkmail papers i find in my IRL mailbox here in Sweden: If you sign up for a 24 month plan on mobile 3G broadband (at $70 a month) you get a Toshiba 15" laptop with 3 GB memory, Athlon X2 and 250 GB hd for $170. For some people that kind of offer makes sense, for others not. But this is just one of several offers that I find in my mail every month. And you bet the buyers will pay the monthly fee, one way or another. Just like with cellphones.

  3. Yo! Asus! Listen up! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Asus's success is killing it. If you've been to their website, it is slow as a pig, 24x7.

    Part of it is due to a clueless webdesigner, who loaded it up with flash, javascript and all sorts of other crap. Add to that a big rise in people visiting, and suddenly their servers are dog slow (at best) and down (too often).

    In fact, it's a classic example of what not to do with web design and IT planning.

    So, Asus, could you PLEASE put some bright people on this, and give them the resources they need?

    At to the bright people: could you PLEASE not make having Javascript and Flash mandatory? Not all of us are smoking the Web 2.0 crack.

    Thanks.