600,000 people sent in $100 deposits for this thing—!😧 (Dumbass is laughing all the way to the bank. )

  • auntieclokwise@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    2 days ago

    I mean they could have jumped on Alibaba, had a customized firmware, had the “gold” color, had a logo or something screen printed on the outside, and probably spent less than $100/phone, at least if current listings are correct. Sell the things for like $299 and they clear $200 profit on each with nearly no effort.

    • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 day ago

      That’s exactly who an ODM is, and Original Design Manufacturer. In the mobile space it’s generally some tech giant like Foxconn which makes tons of devices for tons of brands, and they generally have their own generic designs that they’ll happily white label for any brand

      • auntieclokwise@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 day ago

        Alot of these sellers on Alibaba aren’t nearly up to what an ODM is. They’re sorta more like middlemen that do stuff like take generic phones from ODMs and customize them or just grab parts off the local market and slap them together. To work with somebody like Foxconn, you’d better have some significant volumes - they just won’t talk to you otherwise. Now, maybe Trump is an exception there, but they’re still not going to want to do business unless there’s decent volume in it for them. The volumes I’ve seen for this phone is the sort of thing that wouldn’t even register for them. They’d only even think about it as a way to buy favor.