[Hardware Hacking General] iytrix:
UPDATED 1/7/13

1/7>Added a basic phone model structure layout to this

Hello,

I suppose laying out my business idea for others to take may not be great, but I wanted the communities opinion, since I would start this small and possible not for another year or so. Plus, if someone took the idea, I would be just as glad to see it.

I would like to manufacture two types of phones you rarely see on the market today (if at all)

First type, for the Dev and Tinkerer:

-These phones would be made as cheap as possible, with varying quality. I would like to keep the price as minimal as possible on these phones so that little profit is made, but that way I could get cheap open source devices out to the masses. Whether you want a cheap phone for the kids, or multiple devices for a dev team. Either way, the tricky part will be that I need to know how much to order, because the more I can get the parts in bulk, the cheaper it will be for me to make, and thus, for you all to buy. I am open to any ideas on making the casing, or if anyone has hardware deals or websites that would be good to use for a supplier, that information would be great!

Second type, Luxury:

-I like high quality items. I like fancy packaging, I like products made to LAST. These phones will counter the other devices by price greatly. While the cheaper phones I plan to offer at around $200-400, the luxury phones will be around $ 2,000-4,000. I do plan to profit off of these, but no more than to offset the low price of the cheaper phones. The luxury phones will offer premade designs and models, or more expensive, but entirely custom phones.

I plan to offer a lifetime warranty on the luxury phones. If we cannot fix it, half off a new device. I will also offer a limited warranty as well. I want you to have these devices as long as possible. I want easy to replace screens, modular hardware for upgrades or swapping out the internals but keeping the case (for expensive luxury shells).

The materials for the luxury phones would range from woods to metals like tungsten and titanium. For custom phones we would be open to any ideas you have. This includes extra additions like more buttons or notification LEDs. On phone model I plan for would make use of a set row of notification LEDs and buttons. We will also tailor the AOSP ROM installed on your device to how you want. I hope to be able to hire nice designers to theme the Android operating system to match your custom designed outer design of your phone.

Eventually I would like to venture into tablets yes, and if I start with small, side project type devices, I suppose most would be custom order. If you guys like the idea for the cheap phones I could try for a kickstarter if I can get the suppliers and employees lined up. That way we could order in bulk and deliver cheap devices to the masses.

A bit of me:

The reason why I wanted to do this is because I hate how devices built today are not meant to last. Aside from a few Nokia phones, things just seem cheap, plasticy. I personally would pay extra to have a nice metal shell and reinforced insides to my phone. I want to chose where my power and volume buttons go. I also hate the prices. I think for cheaper phones, we should pay less, and for quality phones, we can afford more.

The last thing, is stock ROMs. I hate them. I love AOSP, and I will work the Open Source feel into all the phones. You will have total control, and hopefully with the help of XDA, you can have a helpful community to help with all issues.I believe in personal costumer service, and if I come back to you in 2 years, I want you to saw your happy you bought a phone my team made, and that you would want to extend the devices life.

If you guys want to help, as questions, post ideas, make comments, feel free!

Basic:

-Price: As low as I can go! ($200-400)

-Internals: Mid range stuff, good enough to run everything smoothly, but the cheapest parts I can find.

-Shell: Possibly 3d printed plastic or other material that are cheap and still durable.

Starting line:

-Price: Around $400

-Internals, same as Basic, but possibly a bit better if requested, or just held in place more securely to survive more drops and beatings

-Shell: Car painting aluminum, steel, or other metals.

(for example http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dockplus/charging-dock-for-iphone-5 it looks plastic, but it's the paint. Very nice finish)

[I plan to offer basic customization options of these, and they may be around $500-600 if need be and could be a "flagship" phone to compete directly with other companies, although I assume the basic model alone will do that]

Luxury:

-Price: $1000-2000

-Internals: the reasonable best. Most likely a quad core processor, high amounts of storage (32GB or so). Internals here will be fairly customizable, possibly even tegra 3 chipsets if requested.

-Shell: TBA. These will be custom made cases, but ones that can be produced more easily, and we won't offer much of customer input for these. Most likely different cases ranging from wood to metal. Later on once we have a designer I plan to actually make drawings and have the community decide on the first wave of Luxury phones. Later I plan to make old custom models into luxury ones.

Custom:

-Price: $2000-4000

-Internals: Whatever they want. The best quality, everything internally will be ruggardized to take a beating. All components will be modular too, hopefully for luxury as well, for easy replacing of parts and screens, so you won't pay that huge up front price again since the case will be the expensive part of these phones.

-Shell: Literally, anything you can dream within realities laws. This is where I plan to have a skilled team, ready to make WHATEVER you want. Want LED trips so your phone lights a whole room the color of the rainbow when you get a text? Sure! Touch back panel? We can try! Extra buttons, yup!

Anything you can think of for a custom phone, we will try and make, and then quote you a price. This is the end goal of the company, and the phone manufacturing will probably start for the basic, and end with the luxury.