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Message
Thanks
for the reply Brent. Striving for cost reduction is a laudatory goal, but being
the cynical bas***d that I am, I doubt if manufacturing cost played but a minor
roll in setting the retail marketing price of the 1100 at CMA. I've been in the
computer manufacturing/software/custom design business for 25 years and I'm hard
pressed to see where CMA has more than $1,500 in manufacturing cost for that
puppy.
So
what drove the 12k retail price point (this price was reported by another
poster, on the GlaStar list, after a call to CMA) at CMA? As Lance N. once so
aptly put it, "Picking the low hanging fruit." CMA risks someone coming out with
a copycat product at a substantially lower price. I don't know, I just feel
they've made a very bad marketing decision. As I said before, I'd buy one in a
heartbeat at a 5-6k price point. 12k, no way, that's more than the price of my
Garmin 530 installed.
It
sure is neat though.
Bruce
www.glasair.org
Hope springs eternal. A major design driver was cost
reduction. Remember that now, more than ever, the turbine and airline guys are
cost sensitive. While I do not have final pricing information on the CMA-1100
I can say that the the target was set to be competitive with the "improved"
consumer tablet computers (e.g. FG-3500) which currently retail in the 6-8K
range.
<SNIP>
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