why did verizon do this?

[roberte1342]

Take the Palm Pre Plus for example. A good phone with high expectations for sales. I was looking forward to it but my contract wasn't up until May. The price started falling rapidly. This led me to believe 2 things; they ordered too many, and people weren't buying them (worst marketing in history). At this time I didn't even consider the Droid or any android phone for that matter. While I watched the price of the Pre drop from $200 to $49 and Palm get gobbled up by HP I started paying attention to rumors of the Moto Shadow with a huge screen. My interest was piqued as were many thousands of others I'm sure.
I'm sure VZW lost a lot on the Pre and didn't want to take a chance of repeating that mistake. After all how could they have really known that people really wanted 4+ inch screens on their phones? I believe they ordered a conservative number from HTC and Moto not realizing how much of a hit these were going to be.

The supply chain problem reminds me of the Wii 4 years ago. Another underestimated device yet hugely popular. It took time and capital to ramp up production. Since the life cycle of high end smartphones is way shorter than the Wii I don't see anyone investing too much capital to ramp up production much faster than they are now. Lets face it The Droid XX will be coming out in 8-9 months from now and this will be mostly forgotten. Hopefully by then lessons will be learned.

 

[increditim]

ok, lots of good ideas! i think those who say that demand just outreached supply may be right. but what about the customer service that's all over the board? woops, that's another rant for another day...

 

[johntkong]

Keeps the demand high,let some out start the talk,makes more people want them. Pretty smart on their part if you ask me.

Yeah, I agree it's a great marketing ploy to send a handful out to let customers do the advertising for them through use and word of mouth. I was at a wedding, and though my Dx didn't steal time from the bride, it did garner a quite a few stares when I whipped it out.

My dad exclaimed, "my god that is big, what is it?".

The Dx definitely turns heads. In a room full of iPhones and BlackBerrys, my Dx definitely made a great first social impression.

 

[bworley50]

It has nothing to do with trying to create demand. The demand is already there. Manufacturers of EVERYTHING are scaling back production as to not be left with high levels of inventory. Manufacturers' reps like Verizon don't want to be left with a bunch of devices, either. It is the slow, global economy. These issues will be resolved and companies will get better at this.

 

[moosc]

Smartphone Makers Struggle With Chip Shortage - Technology News - redOrbit

 

[tech42er#AC]

Yeah, I agree it's a great marketing ploy to send a handful out to let customers do the advertising for them through use and word of mouth. I was at a wedding, and though my Dx didn't steal time from the bride, it did garner a quite a few stares when I whipped it out.

My dad exclaimed, "my god that is big, what is it?".

The Dx definitely turns heads. In a room full of iPhones and BlackBerrys, my Dx definitely made a great first social impression.

It's also great meeting other Android users in public places. Android isn't as ubiquitous as the iPhone or Blackberry, but it's nowhere near as obscure as webOS. There are lots of people who are just starting to get Android phones, so they're somewhere in the public consciousness, but they're still pretty special, which makes it very enjoyable whenever you spot another Android user or someone comes up to talk about your phone.

 

[Jigmeister]

Smartphone Makers Struggle With Chip Shortage - Technology News - redOrbit

Well, there ya have it. Shortages.
However, it still doesn't explain why an order on the 5th or 6th of August is still not filled while orders on the 14/15th are being filled. It's computerized inventory and FedEx. Fill the first orders FIRST. Oh well....