It was the same in my case, except that the first drug-device that started it all was Openmoko Neo Freerunner here

Anyway, the price of Neo900 is hardly a matter of us wanting to sell it expensive. It's mostly inevitable cost of design and production.

With production run estimated at around 350 devices at the moment, it's practically "custom made", and such things always cost much more than their mass production equivalents.

We understand that the price is high and that not everyone who would like to get it will be able to afford it, even when valuing its freedom, security and privacy really high. The only thing we can do to make it cheaper is to make it common - and I'd say we're exactly trying to do that, but with baby-steps. Neo900 first, world domination of open devices next After all, you have to start somewhere.

Still, I guess discussing the "why so expensive" matter again and again is a PITA to everyone involved, so please try to keep it to minimum! Thanks