Freedom 251 Smartphone: More Questions Than Answers

The Freedom 251 smartphone will official be unveiled by manufacturer Ringing Bells in India shortly, and it seems to be the cheapest smartphone in the whole world. Running Android 5.1, it sounds on paper like a usable phone - it might not impress anyone, but at a price of just Rs. 251, it doesn't exactly need to blow you away in terms of performance. However, there are some points for concern about the phone, as was noticed when we first got our Freedom 21 unit.

For starters, the Freedom 251 unit we received bears the logo of Adcom, which has been covered with a sticker. Adcom is a Delhi-based importer of IT products that deals in smartphones and tablets. At first glance, the Freedom 251 appears similar to the Adcom Ikon 4 and has reasonably similar specifications as well. The Adcom Ikon 4 has also got a similar design, and has a 4-inch display, Android 5.1, a 1.3GHz quad-core processor, 5-megapixel rear camera, and 1.3-megapixel front camera, with 8GB of storage, and 1GB of RAM.

What's more, the UI of the Freedom 251 has been customised to look a lot like an iPhone. In fact, many of the icons look identical to apps that ship with Apple's phone, which makes us wonder if it will attract some attentions from lawyers at Cupertino.
That's not the only cause for concern though. All phones sold in India must be certified by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). Getting this certification done is both time consuming and expensive. However, it appears that the BIS registration of the Ringing Bells Freedom 251 has not been done, as it is not listed in the list of manufacturers registered by BIS. This means that if the phone is a new device made by Ringing Bells, then it has not been certified as safe for use in India.

What this means is that the Adcom A400, or at least some variant thereof, could well be the origin of the Freedom 251. That phone was made two years ago, and if old stock were to be repurposed, it would explain the relatively low cost of the phones. It still sounds like a great deal at Rs. 251, though perhaps less of a Make in India accomplishment than it is being made out to be.

Gadgets 360 wrote to a Ringing Bells representative asking about concerns raised in this article, and we received a mail that stating "all answers will be given on stage in the presence of the ministers". Let's hope we get answers to our questions about Freedom 251 shortly.

Ringing Bells Freedom 251, priced at Rs 251 launched: Here’s how to buy

Ringing Bells Freedom 251 was launched yesterday: BJP Senior leader Murli Manhor Joshi ,Director of Ringing Bells, Mohit Goel and CEO, Dhaarna Goel during the launch of Smartphone-Ringing Bells Freedom 251, in New Delhi on Wednesday. (Source: PTI)

The world’s cheapest smartphone, costing all of Rs 251 ($5), was launched in New Delhi on Wednesday.

The Ringing Bells Freedom 251, a 3G smartphone with specifications similar to entry level smartphones priced around Rs 4,000, 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.

While bookings for the phone will start tomorrow and go on till February 22, the Noida-based company expects says it will finish all deliveries by 30th June.

Ringing Bells is selling Freedom 251 via a special website called www.freedom251.com and says all deliveries will take 4 months to complete. Ringing Bells is charging Rs 40 extra for deliveries, so the total cost of the smartphone is Rs 291.

The smartphone with 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.

Bookings for the Freedom 251 will start from Thursday 18 February from 6.00 am in the morning and will close on 21 February at 8.00 pm. This is dual-SIM 3G capable phone. Customers have however reported that the website kept crashing, and they were unable to complete payment for the Freedom 251 smartphone.

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. “By going for Made in India components, we can save on the 13.8 per cent, also we will be selling online first and thus save the costs incurred on large distribution networks,” said Chadha.

Ringing Bells’ President says that they want to capture nearly 30 per cent of the smartphone market by the end of the year. The company 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.
 

 Director of Ringing Bells, Mohit Goel with CEO, Dhaarna Goel during the launch of Smartphone-Ringing Bells Freedom 251, in New Delhi on Wednesday. (Source: PTI)

Sunit Singh Tuli, the CEO of Datawind which produces the $35 Akash tablet for the government a few years back, told indianexpress.com that a 3G device with the specs offered has a base manufacturing cost almost 8X higher than what’s being offered.

“So, we’re interested in learning of how they’ve achieved this, including all the licensing fees etc. We hope this is not a small marketing promotion, and is broadly available to the 100 crore Indians that need such affordable technology,” he said. Tuli added that if they can deliver on quality the phone will become a serious challenge to the entire smartphone industry.

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