The Samsung Galaxy S5 has received the customary teardown treatment, revealing some interesting details regarding the hardware inside. If you’ve been concerned by the rise in price of the new flagship compared to the predecessor, this might partly explain that. The components found inside the S5 have been revealed to cost $256 and that’s not including the R&D or marketing costs.
The most expensive component on the smartphone is reportedly the display which costs approximately $63 to make, even though it’s being developed by Samsung. Other parts like the RAM and flash memory come in at $33, and are also manufactured in-house. The fingerprint sensor on the Galaxy S5 costs a mere $4 to make, which is not a lot compared to the Touch ID sensor on the Apple iPhone 5s that rings in at $15.
Overall cost of assembly, which is basically putting together all the components is reportedly $5. So adding all that up, the total cost of manufacturing comes up to approximately $256. The smartphone retails in some regions for $700-800 while in the U.S., the off contract pricing of the handset is under $650. So it’s clear that Samsung is making plenty of profits with its new flagship, which is not surprising for the top Android OEM in the market today.
[Via Re/Code]