Journalism of Courage
Ringing Bells, maker of Freedom 251, has answered questions being raised by the country. It claims to be a part of the Android Developer Platform. Read more here
Ringing Bells Freedom 251 is the world's cheapest smartphone at Rs 251. The company is charging Rs 40 extra for deliveries, so the total cost of the smartphone is Rs 291. Ringing Bells is a Noida-based company which was so far dealing in agriculture commodities. The Ringing Bells Freedom 251 is a 3G smartphone with specifications similar to entry level smartphones priced around Rs 4,000. The registration for the smartphone has already begun and the company will be selling it online first to save the costs incurred on large distribution networks. Read more here
The Freedom 251 smartphone has a 4-inch WVGA resolution display, features a 1.3 Ghz quad-core processor, 1GB RAM, 8GB total storage space and a 3.2 megapixel camera on the back. It will have 0.3 megapixel camera on the front and has a 1450 mAh battery. This is dual-SIM 3G capable phone. Read more here
Bookings for the Freedom 251 started from 6.00 am in the morning today and will close on 21 February at 8.00 pm. Users are, however, facing problems while trying to book the smartphone as there have been complaints of the website crashing. Read more here
Ringing Bells has set up two pilot plants in Noida and Uttarakhand and claims to have a capacity of 5 lakh phones on these lines. Ringing Bells says that they are looking at an investment of Rs 230-250 crores on these plants. The company will finish all deliveries by June 30. Read more here
Asked to explain the pricing, company President of Ringing Bells Ashok Chadha said they were not subsidised by the government, and would benefit from economies of scale. Ringing Bells is selling Freedom 251 via a special website called http://www.freedom251.com and says all deliveries will take 4 months to complete. Read more here
Ringing Bells’ President says that they want to capture nearly 30 per cent of the smartphone market by the end of the year. The Freedom 251 was launched by senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi. Defence Minister Manohar Parikkar, who the company had said would launch the phone, could not make it due to a “cabinet meeting,” according to the event’s organisers. Read more here
Interestingly, the booking limit of number of units of Freedom 251, which was unlimited until yesterday has been cut to just one per user now. This basically means that only 1 unit of Freedom 251 smartphone can be booked by a user and that whatever bookings that came in on Thursday has overwhelmed the company. Read more here
Also, while booking the smartphone, the Ringing Bells Freedom 251 website just refused to take many users to the the payment gateway despite filling in the details. Read more here
