Nanonote Manufacturing
From Qi-Hardware
We want countries to produce their own Ben Nanonote. Here is a quick breakdown on the logic and prices of making our first Nanonote. If the costs in a local jurisdiction can be cheaper, we encourage doing self. Of course, hiring out our company is also great!
From Wolfgang:
Jon, yes this is the right direction. To find out which part of the work makes sense to localize (i.e. where a local production makes economic sense), you need to know the prices on both ends well. Also some countries have import taxes to help grow a local production, for example in Brazil it costs 60% tax to import a fully assembled phone, as opposed to importing just components that are then assembled in Brazil. So you would want to look at this kind of taxes too. If they exist, avoiding those taxes with local production can be lucrative. Otherwise it could be assembly & production testing, or SMT/COB. Maybe even local producers of some electrical components? Probably hard to beat China prices on those however. The most expensive component in the NanoNote is the LCM, not sure whether there is local & competitive LCM production in some local countries. I doubt it. Same for CPU, SDRAM & NAND, for a number of reasons. Breakdown per device: LCM: 12 USD all plastic parts: 8 USD 2 GB NAND: 6 USD SDRAM: 2 USD CPU: 2 USD PCB: 2 USD other parts on the PCB: 4 USD SMT & COB: estimated 10-15 USD total including yield assembly & testing: estimated 10-15 USD total including yield Bottom line I would focus on: 1. import taxes 2. SMT & assembly/production testing 3. mechanical tooling & plastic injection 4. PCB LCM if there is competitive local production, stay away from the rest. Wolfgang