It seems that many companies are not seriously considering low cost products for emerging markets. Last week it was TATA group in India that launch its low cost car (TATA Nano) for under US $2,500 and now recently another company HCL Technologies launched its low cost laptop, "MiLeap X", that will be available for just US $350. It is not sure if the Indian market is still so fancy to buy an cheap laptop for this price when a desktop with very good configurations can be bought for the same price tag. Other drawback of the product is the screen size, Indian customers are generally happy with big things for lower price. it has chosen Linux for this low cost laptop that is obviously and welcome step for the emerging economies. It is not a good idea to sell leptops preinstalled with Windows (it was XP and not is coming with Vista). I have used Vista and did not liked that too much and many people have reported that it also have compatibility issues with hardware as well as softwares. Well, issue is not about the technical dificulty for the home users, more important is the cost of the Windows products. Interstingly, demand for the Linux based computers is increasing fast, perhaps because one of the major advantage of having Windows was that it was user friendly but its new versions it is becoming too difficult for the home users and people find it almost same (or even more) difficult to operate as Linux.
I am not expecting too high volume sale for this laptop but company will surely we able to make profit because it has its own manufacturing facilities in India. I am waiting for someone to launch low cost iPod and iPhone in developing countries.
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