India seeks new supplier for $35 Android tablet
Performance grumbles
The Indian Government is seeking extra manufacturers for the Aakash, the $35 Android tablet that launched in the sub-continent in 2011.
The Aakash, built by British company DataWind to an India Institute of Technology spec, has been blasted for its slow processor speed, low battery capacity and unresponsive touchscreen. Mind you, what do they expect for 35 bucks?
Just 10,000 units have shipped since October 2011 and the relationship between the Indian government and DataWind has turned sour, Reuters reports.
India's Human Resource Development Ministry is due to launch a tender in a few weeks, seeking new partners to build the tablet, which could spell bad weather for DataWind.
As if to say as much, a senior government official said is not a certainty that because a manufacturer has done phase one, it will automatically be hired for phase two.
DataWind was contracted to manufacture 100,000 tablets. The second phase calls for the production of a further 1m units.
DataWind co-developed the tablet with the Indian Institute of Technology, which allegedly changed its proposed requirements late last year, asking for US Military durability yet at the same low price.
The official said the next bidding war will centre on producing a tablet with a better spec for the same or a lower price.
Just eight per cent of India's billion-plus population has access to the internet, a statistic the Indian Government is keen to change. ®
COMMENTS
Re: DfID
But producing these tablets keeps the little children of the lower castes in employment. They would have to go to school otherwise.
DfID
So our government is sending money to India to put towards the poor and needy. Meanwhile the Indian government is trying to ensure that it's whole population has access to the internet through cheap devices. Does anyone wonder if priorities have got a bit cocked up?
Look, if the Indian government doesn't want to help it's needy, then it's none of our business. If it was then there wouldn't be any exceptions and we would be helping the poor and needy all over the world, including the UK. The fact that we aren't shows that putting money into India is only a method by which British civil servents get to keep their jobs.
Re: DfID
To equate the poor and needy of the UK to the poor and needy of India shows a lack of understanding of the levels of poverty throughout India.
It's a serious simplification to suggest that there is one politics of India that always moves together; it's a federation consisting of 35 states or territories, many of them no more willing to help their neighbours than you and just as quick to play the 'look, it's none of our business what happens over there' card.
If you make the fair redistribution of wealth a criteria before a country qualifies for aid then another way of phrasing that is that you're reserving aid for strict socialist countries, of which none currently exist.
The logical conclusion of 'if we help some we must help all; otherwise we should help nobody at all' is that even if we hypothetically had the money and the means to prevent the deaths of 99% of those that starve each year then we shouldn't do so.
About 40% of the population of India lives below the international poverty line and hence face a daily struggle for food, suffer from curable diseases, etc. Our aid to India helps improve conditions for some of them. If we withdraw the aid, those people will be worse off. To my mind, that justifies the aid.
Re: DfID
You don't view providing education as "helping the needy"? One thing that properly poor communities have in common is their aspiration to send their children to school.
Re: ... what's the customer service like?
I understand the call center is in Slough.
