电信分析师们坚信，除非苹果（Apple）推出一款廉价手机，否则它将错失全球数十亿尚未购买智能手机的潜在顾客。

    但是，正如本尼迪克特•埃文斯上周三在《关于廉价版iPhone》（Note on cheap iPhones）一文中所述的那样，所谓一部“廉价智能手机”怎么定义，人们的看法并不相同。

    他把智能手机市场细分为4个价格区间：（以下引用原文）

    •0-100美元区间：目前这一市场的主导者包括一些鲜为人知的公司。它们使用联发科技（Mediatek）、展讯通信（Spreadtrum）等公司的成品芯片。虽然此类智能手机运行安卓系统（Android），使用3G技术，但是它们的内存通常只有256兆，导致用户体验极为糟糕。制造工艺和屏幕也乏善可陈。

    •100-200美元区间：在这个价格区间，开始出现一些知名品牌公司的身影，包括诺基亚Lumia520、小米科技（Xiaomi）的红米手机和摩托罗拉的MotorolaX，这些手机均能提供无可挑剔的用户体验。我把这些手机比喻为汽车中的丰田（Toyota）或大众（VW）：你清楚你开的的不是宝马（BMW）或宾利（Bentley），但它们整体上挑不出什么毛病，甚至部分产品非常棒。

    •200-450美元（左右）区间，中端手机；

    •450-500美元及以上价格区间，高端手机。事实上，还有超高端市场细分。

    埃文斯指出，当人们提到，苹果会错失仍在使用功能型手机的那部分顾客时，其实他们指的是第一个市场价格区间。

    “这个市场包括200美元以下的个人电脑，商品利润率极低，用户体验也很差，”他指出，“就连三星（Samsung）也不会真正进军这一市场。”

    第二、第三个价格区间的市场则另当别论。埃文斯认为，苹果如今可以轻而易举地推出250-350美元的iPhone，哪怕是乔布斯也会引以为豪的。问题在于，这在财务上值不值。

    在以下表格中，埃文斯对这些数据进行了分析。

    It is an article of faith among telecom analysts that unless Apple makes a cheap iPhone, it will miss out on the billions of potential customers around the world who have not yet bought a smartphone.

    But as Benedict Evans pointed out Wednesday in his Note on cheap iPhones, not everybody agrees on what constitutes a cheap smartphone.

    He divides the market into four segments: (I quote)

    •$50-100 smartphones: currently these are dominated by companies you’ve never heard of using off-the-shelf chips from Mediatek, Spreadtrum and others, and though they run Android and have 3G they often have only 256 meg of RAM, which makes for a pretty poor experience. And the build quality and screens are not great.

    •$100 to (say) $200 – this is where the branded companies start playing. At this price devices like the Lumia 520, the Xiaomi Hongmi and the Motorola X provide an experience that you would not, actually, be unhappy with. I describe these phones as like driving a Toyota or a VW: you know you’re not in a BMW (or a Bentley), but there’s nothing wrong with them at all and some of them are pretty cool.

    •Then, $200-450 (or thereabouts) counts as mid-range, and

    •$450-500 and up counts as premium. Arguably there’s a super-premium segment further up.

    When people talk about Apple losing all those customers still using feature phones, Evans writes, they are actually talking about the first category.

    “This is is the land of the $200 PC — very low margin commodities with a poor user experience,” he writes. “Even Samsung doesn’t really play here.”

    The second and third category are another matter. Evans contends that Apple today could easily make a $250 to $300 iPhone even Steve Jobs would be proud of. The question is whether it would be worth it financially.

    In the spreadsheet copied below, he’s run the numbers.

    上表显示，250美元iPhone将引发轰动，年销量可达4,000万部，毛利润可达20亿美元。但是，把对苹果高端手机市场份额不可避免的内部蚕食因素考虑在内，250美元iPhone对苹果毛利润的贡献率只有5%。从盈利角度而言，300美元iPhone将是表现最优秀的产品；但它对苹果毛利润的贡献率也只有7%。

    埃文斯得出结论：这并不意味着不值得发展廉价版产品，特别是考虑到它能强化iOS生态系统和削弱安卓系统。

    问题的关键在于，选择权在苹果手上。它只要想，就可以随时推出廉价iPhone。（财富中文网）

    译者：乔树静/汪皓

    What this shows is that a $250 iPhone would be a blockbuster, selling 40 million units a year and generating $2 billion in gross profit But after factoring in the inevitable cannibalization of Apple’s high-end phones, such a phone would add only 5% to the company’s gross profit. The sweet spot, in terms of the bottom line, is a $300 iPhone, but even that only adds 7% to Apple’s gross profit.

    This doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing, Evans concludes, especially if it strengthens the iOS ecosystem and weakens Android’s.

    The point is, the choice is Apple’s, and it can make it whenever it wants.