Google's India Smartphone With Custom Android OS Launches November 4 For $87

Google and top Indian telecom network Jio Platforms said on Friday that their much-anticipated budget smartphone, JioPhone Next, will go on sale in the world's second largest smartphone market on November 4. From a report: The firms said the JioPhone Next will cost 6,499 Indian rupees ($87), and can also be purchased in multiple instalments with an entry price as low as $27. The smartphone runs Pragati OS, which is powered by an "extremely optimized" Android mobile operating system with a range of customized feature. The two firms also revealed the specifications of the JioPhone Next. The smartphone features a 5.45-inch HD+ display with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. It is powered by Qualcomm's quad-core QM-215 chipset that clocks up to 1.3GHz, coupled with 2GB of RAM and 32GB internal storage, which is expandable.

What's missing?

[iampiti]

I wonder what's missing in that "extremely optimized" version of Android. I wish modern OSs were more modular and that I could be able to completely remove features I'm not gonna use. In smartphones maybe battery life would improve a bit.

Re:

[Nrrqshrr]

Exactly my thought. If it's optimized, why cant we have it? Was the stuff removed useless bloat or data snooping "features" they couldnt find a buyer for in India?

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[iampiti]

I'm sure they removed stuff against their will. They had to make it work on limited hardware so I'm pretty sure they had to give up things that they would've preferred to stay

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[NateFromMich]

I wonder what's missing in that "extremely optimized" version of Android. I wish modern OSs were more modular and that I could be able to completely remove features I'm not gonna use. In smartphones maybe battery life would improve a bit.

Removing gapps optimizes the hell out of Android, at least from what I've found.

Re:

[iampiti]

Makes sense. They're probably getting your location at intervals (well, I do have location history enabled on Google Maps so they definitely poll my position at short intervals) and gathering and sending data to the mothership

87 is a lot

[backslashdot]

This is like the price of an iPhone 13 Pro when you consider the median Indian salary. Actually it is way more than that, because the less money you have the more valuable the money is to you. When you have less money you need to spend more of it on the essentials. In other words, if you have 10 million dollars and lose 20 percent of it your survival is not threatened â" you can still live OK, whereas if you only have 100 dollars and have to give up 20 percent of it, that is worse because you cannot af

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[NateFromMich]

Well, in a poor country, even a cheap smartphone is a luxury item.

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[Osgeld]

its not even really that cheap one can easily pickup a pre paid no contract phone for 30 bucks with similar specs (at least in the US)

IE
https://www.tracfone.com/phone... [tracfone.com]

Re: 87 is a lot

[ami.one]

Yup, Samsung m01 or such are $100 and mi and other chinese brands are $80 with everything this has or better

Based on a huge amount of customer reviews on amazon.in these phones all seem to be fairly usable ! For entry level customers at least

Pragati OS is just a skin for android with some rebranded / co-branded apps

BOM cost would be interesting

[bobm]

I wonder if it's selling for less than the cost of the parts? If not it is probably pretty close. It's said that just the patent costs for an iphone is in the order of $30 per phone.

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[backslashdot]

I don’t think they are licensing the same stuff as an iPhone. I think their BOM cost can be under $70. It is basically like Raspberry Pi (bom cost $20) .. and then if we check Ali-express prices (Jio can probably get better deals): a 4G module ($16 - https://m.alibaba.com/product/... [alibaba.com] ), 5.5 inch TFT 720p display($15 - https://m.alibaba.com/product/... [alibaba.com] ), and batteries ($8) and case ($2). $5 for misc costs like camera and assembly.

The 100$ laptop!

[nospam007]

Finally!

Ok handtop.

I have a Samsung J3. $100. full android.

[Nihil_75]

Why spend so much time developing a lobotomized device?