iPad mini bill of materials estimate suggests Apple would price tablet at $299

By now, most sources are unanimous - Apple is planning to unveil an iPad mini, a smaller, more compact, 7.85-inch tablet at a separate event in October. It’s not certain by any means, but it’s the first time in the couple of years since the rumor first surfaced, that we’re hearing from all places and where is smoke there should be fire.

One thing we’ve come to expect so far is that the iPad mini will be a cheaper iPad. The arrival of $199 7-inch tablets like the Nexus 7 and the Kindle Fire have opened a new price niche where Apple doesn’t have a competing product. But how much could the iPad mini cost, so that it’s both competitive and money-making? Looking at the bill of materials for the Nexus 7 and earlier the Kindle Fire, Apple should price it at $299 if it aims for 30% or bigger gross margin, according to the Tech-thoughts blog.

Now, there are quite a lot of assumptions here, but they all seem logical. With the Nexus 7 having a pretty stellar battery life, we could assume Apple would pay about as much for the iPad mini battery, as well as for memory, camera and wireless. The manufacturing cost and sensors should match the bill of materials from the iPad 2, as those costs are not changing much.

The two big questions left are the processor and the display. The iPad mini processor could be the same one as on iPad 2,4, the latest version of the iPad that Apple is releasing with a 32nm A5 chip. The display is the most expensive thing in the iPad mini - it’s expected to feature the same resolution as on the iPad 2 (and that’s 1,024 x 768 pixels) but at a smaller size.

Now, if Apple manages to get the display price lower, it seems possible that even at $249 the iPad mini could sell with a gross margin of more than 24%. If not, and Apple continues its high-margin strategy, the price of the iPad mini should be $299.

What do you think of the possibility of such an iPad mini, would you buy that?

source: Tech-thoughts.net