[m8te]

In the UK we had a similar price drop. From £150 down to £64, which is what I bought a pair for. Great for the price, really good bargain. 

 

[kiteki]

 
They were losing money at that price, the materials of the UE700 cost more. =p
 
 
 
 

 

[Ikarios]

Quote:

 
They were losing money at that price, the materials of the UE700 cost more. =p
 

Unless you know actual manufacturing costs I find this doubtful. I was shocked when I discovered prices of BA drivers, even per unit prices.
 

 

[kiteki]

 
Quote:

Unless you know actual manufacturing costs I find this doubtful. I was shocked when I discovered prices of BA drivers, even per unit prices.
 

That's what I was referring to, for a single unit of the driver inside the UE700 it costs me $71 + shipping.
 
 

 
 

 

[a_recording]

I'm pretty sure in the bulk quantities that companies order the price would be several orders less. lol and way to go Kiteki, resurrecting a thread, I'm trying to imagine how excited you were to hear about $70 UE700's heh.

 

[Ikarios]

Quote:

 

That's what I was referring to, for a single unit of the driver inside the UE700 it costs me $71 + shipping.
 

Is it a TWFK? Digikey has it for $53 plus shipping at one unit, $30.10 for 5000 units (and you need two for a set). I'm sure UE made more than 2500 UE700s, and they probably use the driver elsewhere as well. Digikey also has to make money, and Logitech probably buys it from Knowles direct.

 

[kiteki]

 
Yes it's a TWFK,
 
These are the prices I'm getting from x-on
 
1:
$69.44
10:
$61.72
25:
$55.55
100:
$49.38
 
 
Ok so sure Ultimate Ears can pay less than $50 for the driver itself, then what about the cable, housing, workmanship, packaging, glossy colour brochure that comes with it, documents, hard-case, extra tips, warranty, graphic designers, marketing department?
 
=P
 
 
 
 

 

[a_recording]

Quote:

 
Yes it's a TWFK,
 
These are the prices I'm getting from x-on
 
1:
$69.44
10:
$61.72
25:
$55.55
100:
$49.38
 
 
Ok so sure Ultimate Ears can pay less than $50 for the driver itself, then what about the cable, housing, workmanship, packaging, glossy colour brochure that comes with it, documents, hard-case, extra tips, warranty, graphic designers, marketing department?
 
=P
 
 
 
 

All the physical materials are very, very cheap. I'm doing work with medical supplies at the moment, where everything is high precision metal and sterilisable plastic, and even at low prices the margin is enormous for this stuff to be manufactured and sold. It's the marketing / design that costs money - which is why the big brands (with their big marketing budgets) are regarded with such suspicion on Head Fi, and the no-name Chinese brands conversely get so much enthusiasm.
 
*EDIT* On another note, all the buy prices you can find out on the internet from Knowles is no good indicator, considering that at the quantity companies like UE are buying the drivers, they will be negotiating their own buying agreements. You may think the TWFK is a very high precision piece of technology, but think about this: an intel CPU in 2005 cost $40 to manufacture. That is a process that requires absolute clean rooms with no dust, precision down to the nanometer, and the process technology becomes obsolete every few years and they have to retrofit or replace all the equipment, or even the entire fabrication facility. Yet Intel is making billions, and think about chip prices in 2005 compared to what kind of performance and price you get today. I wouldn't be surprised if the IEM companies paid less than $5 for any of these drivers. 
 

 

[kiteki]

 
Quote:

All the physical materials are very, very cheap. I'm doing work with medical supplies at the moment, where everything is high precision metal and sterilisable plastic, and even at low prices the margin is enormous for this stuff to be manufactured and sold. It's the marketing / design that costs money - which is why the big brands (with their big marketing budgets) are regarded with such suspicion on Head Fi,  and the no-name Chinese brands conversely get so much enthusiasm.
 
*EDIT* On another note, all the buy prices you can find out on the internet from Knowles is no good indicator, considering that at the quantity companies like UE are buying the drivers, they will be negotiating their own buying agreements. You may think the TWFK is a very high precision piece of technology, but think about this: an intel CPU in 2005 cost $40 to manufacture. That is a process that requires absolute clean rooms with no dust, precision down to the nanometer, and the process technology becomes obsolete every few years and they have to retrofit or replace all the equipment, or even the entire fabrication facility. Yet Intel is making billions, and think about chip prices in 2005 compared to what kind of performance and price you get today. I wouldn't be surprised if the IEM companies paid less than $5 for any of these drivers. 
 

I think LESS THAN $5 is overdoing it a bit, at the end of the day the companies that could theoretically make deals for less than $5 are the ones that put $4 million into marketing, so I guess it evens out Lol.
 
 
Your comment about no-name Chinese brands works well in theory, but not so well in practice.  The Yuin OK1 for example selling at $229? I always looked at it as hugely overpriced while I was reading comments on head-fi like "This company is great they use cheap crappy quality and focus 100% on SQ!!!!xD YOU GET SO MUCH MORE SQ THAN WESTERN COMPANIES"
 
That's what everyone was writing when I joined head-fi, now a bit later I saw the Yuin OK1 selling recently at zococity.es for $90 USD (..?!)
 
Same thing with the Hifiman RE0 that used to retail for $199 (???).
 
Nice one peter pan.