Sales during the
week of the initial launch of Nexus One probably didn't go as well as Google had planned, but maybe at the least consumers will feel as if they bought a solid device.
About 20,000 Nexus One
units sold in its first week -- a number that paled in comparison to the Android-based myTouch at 60,000, the Droid at 250,000, and the iPhone 3 GS at 1.6 million during the same period, according to
estimates from mobile analytics firm Flurry.
Google's new direct-to-consumer sales model
had an impact, the analyst firm notes. The no-contract $529 price tag, launch after the holiday season, and unusual approach to trickle out information about the phone on the Internet probably also
contributed to soft sales. Consumers could always pay $179 with a two-year service contract from T-Mobile.
Since the phone went on sale, Trip Chowdhry, managing director at Global Equities
Research, estimates Google sold about 30,000 as of Jan. 11. His research indicates the demand for Nexus One is high overseas, and consumers are buying multiple phones for friends. A faster processor,
AM-OLED display and Android 2.1 operating system are some of the reasons why.
Nexus One, manufactured by HTC, includes many emerging smartphone innovations in one product, according to research
firm iSuppli. A teardown by the El Segundo, Calif. company reveals that Google's Nexus One cost $174.15 to manufacture based on a preliminary estimate of hardware and components. The estimate does not
take into consideration other expenses, such as marketing, manufacturing, software, box contents, accessories and royalties.
But if Google wanted to traditionally market the Nexus One, it could
mention a few innovations other than the applications it loads on the phone.
At the heart of the Nexus One is Qualcomm Snapdragon baseband processor, about $30.50 each, which sports 1GHz clock
speed, according to iSuppli. This processor gives the Nexus One some advanced capabilities, most notably high-definition 720p video playback. Android developers might want to know the speed when
designing a marketing campaign for consumers who use the phone. The phone also has a 3.7-inch AM-OLED display from Samsung Mobile Display that costs about $23.70 for each phone.
The dual
microphone design used for cancellation of background noise is also featured in Motorola's Droid, according to iSuppli. To implement the noise cancellation function, the Nexus One has a special audio
voice processor chip from Audience Semiconductor. The research firm says it's the first time its teardown analysis team service has come across a part from this manufacturer in any electronic product.
Other components include Samsung Semiconductor's Double Data Rate (DDR) DRAM, employing 4Gbit; and a touchscreen from Synaptics for about $17.50 for each phone.