Galaxy S5 Teardown Reveals Estimated Build Cost

A few days ago, we saw the first teardown of the Samsung Galaxy S5 smartphone. That first teardown came from the folks over at iFixit and was focused on seeing how repairable the smartphone is in case you damage it. Teardowns are also a nice way to see just what the devices look like inside the case.

Another Galaxy S5 teardown has surfaced and this time rather than looking at how easy it is to repair, the goal was to see what the device costs to build. Naturally, this isn't a firm build cost, just an estimate. Market research firm IHS is the company providing the latest teardown and the associated bill of materials that it estimates each of the components inside the smartphone case cost.

IHS ended up with a bill of materials for the S5 of $256. The company says that it used to be that a flagship phone sold for about $600 off contract and had a bill of materials that cost about $200. However, the bill of materials has moved up with each new generation of smartphones and IHS says that the costs are now regularly above $250 per unit.

Inside the S5, the Company says there is nothing extraordinary and that there are many components inside we have seen before. IHS says that Samsung really isn't pushing the envelope anywhere inside the S5. The most expensive component in the smartphone is the display costing about $63. The Samsung supplied DRAM and flash memory cost about $33 combined. The fingerprint sensor cost about $4 with the biosensor for health data costing about $1.45. The cost estimate doesn't take into account software, distribution, or marketing, but it does include assembly.

SOURCE: Recode