Cheap Android smartphones coming soon

From InfoWorld: New low-cost smartphones running Google's Android software have been launched in Taiwan recently and the good news is they should start showing up just about everywhere soon.

A new group of companies, electronics contract manufacturers, are starting to make high-end mobile phones, including smartphones, for mobile network operators around the world, and these are companies adept at slashing prices.

These manufacturers are companies many people in the West have never heard of, such as Quanta Computer, which makes laptop PCs for global giants including Hewlett-Packard and Dell. Quanta made an Android smartphone for network operator Taiwan Mobile, which launched on Tuesday. Another company, Commtiva Technology, a subsidiary of the world's largest electronics contract manufacturing company, Hon Hai Precision Industry, built an Android handset for Far EasTone Telecommunications, another Taiwanese network operator.

Taiwan has traditionally led the way with cost cutting in everything from PCs to game consoles and mobile phones, through low cost manufacturing on the island and in China. The prices of the two new smartphones are around half that of comparable models from major handset vendors. Taiwan Mobile next week will start selling the TWM T1 smartphone for NT$8,990 (US$280) with no service contract.

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