The iSuppli website has delivered a “parts and price” breakdown for the Apple iPhone 4 and the results are pretty interesting. According to the study, this new iPhone is considered to be the second most expensive handset that Apple had produced (with the original iPhone still holding the most expensive parts cost title).
The sum value of the parts for Apple’s iPhone is estimated to be at 125 Pounds. That sounds rather cheap for a device that is priced at almost 500 Pounds. But that is just the cost of the parts alone. It does not take into consideration the amount of money and resources that it takes to manufacturing the mobile phone itself.
Smart phones, like the Apple iPhone, go through a long and expensive process before it is made. From the initial designs to the engineering studies, the phone is continuously updated, improved, redesigned, edited and more before a final production copy is finally made ready. Only after that is the device actually manufactured –and the costs do not stop there. Packaging, shipping and many other processes are also included in the overall costing of smart phones.
Studying the “cost” of the individual parts, it is surprising to learn some interesting things. First off, the A4 CPU is actually quite cheap, coming out at a reasonable 10 GBP. One would think that the processor would actually be a costly part of the handset (as that is often the case for computers).
Samsung’s NAND flash technology is among the most expensive parts –considering that the iPhone’s internal memory is the only thing that the device relies upon, it is good to know that Apple has chosen a very high end part for this role. The touch screen display is the second most expensive part and as many of you may have already heard, the touch screen has some production issues. Some iPhones suffer from what appears to be a yellowish liquid smear within the touch screen.
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