AIUI the Raspberry Pi was first put on sale on 29 February 2012. Monday will be 29 February 2016. As such we are coming up to the 1st or 4th anniversary of its launch, depending on how you look at it.
With so many new models it has been quite a journey in the last four years, hasn't it? Not to mention the many different things people have done with the box.
James
Indeed so :)
It has completely stunned everyone - including the original designers. I have a quiet chuckle at how it has also wrong-footed the 'experts' at every turn, and left the usual suspects in a confused heap when they tried to undercut it or otherwise muscle in.
Long may it continue :)
I am amazed that a product could be manufactured in the UK, with its relatively high wages, rather than in the far east. That is no more true
Indeed.
James
All of them I've seen recently in the US carry a China label. And they were sourced from the licensed authorized distribution chain. But, I wonder about custom versions that can be be supposedly obtained via the same channels. The Pi 0 that came in today with a copy of volume 40 has a china mask label.
They are being manufactured in China primarilly for the Asian market but it might not be a surprise if they travel further...
The Chinese ones after they started UK manufacture were red initially, but I don't know if that's carried on.
Gordon
The actual manufacturing of the product of course is fully robotized.
This still requires some manual labor around packaging, storage, parts handling etc. That would still be cheaper in China.
Shipping is cheaper from Wales.
Really? Over here in the Netherlands it is cheaper to get a package shipped from China than it is from the other side of the city...
Plenty of Arduino shields etc on Ebay for 99p including shipping from China. I don't think that is economically possible domestically.
It's not cheaper once you factor in the subsidy that customers of European postal services are effectively paying to Chinese exporters.
Why would you do that? It is apparently not a problem for them or they would stop doing it, or at least bring the problem up for discussion.
Sure it amazes me as well, but apparently it is not an issue.
How is it a subsidy from European postal services? I think you have it turned around, the Chinese government is subsidizing the low postal rates they pay.
Royal Mail doesn't get paid by Chinese senders - it's assumed[1] that mail from UK to China is about the same as mail from China to UK, and each mail service keeps the payment at its own end. Of course there are many more packets sent from China to UK, and Royal Mail has to find the cost of delivering this mail from somewhere - its UK customers.
[1] See "Treaty of Bern", "Universal Postal Union" etc.
There's no assumption. Each country pays for services in its own country in both directions. End of story. They do this to keep it all simple. Calling it a subsidy is just putting your spin on it.
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