Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone Teardown

Main Features

Mid-range clamshell HSDPA UMTS 850/1900, quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE phone. Main features include a 2.0 MP camera, a 2.3' 240 x 320 262K color TFT display. The phone also have built-in Bluetooth V2.0 (EDR) connectivity with A2DP, and a generous (although it's becoming fairly common) dose of resident memory with 1Gbits of NAND Flash, and 512Mbits of SDRAM, as well as a MicroSD memory extension slot. On a side note, it will also support Video sharing that ATT is going to introduce soon.

Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone Main Image

The Samsung SGH-A717, as AT&T claims, is the slimmest HSDPA phone in its 3G line up. It is rolled out in parallel with the SGH-A727, basically a candybar version of the SGH-A717. Judging from the model number and look, the SGH-a717 is a successor of the SGH-A707 we previously analyzed and is mean to support many AT&T's services such as AT&T Mobile Music, Cellular Video, access to MobiTV and MobiRadio. The only notable upgrade is the primary display is now 2.6' instead of 2.3' in the SGH-A707.

Target Market

Mainstream users interested in media downloading / streaming features which take advantage of new HSDPA high speed network.

Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone - Main PCB Top

Per AT&T's press release, available June 4, 2007

Pricing and Availability

Per press release, available for $149.99 with a 2-year contract and $50 mail in rebate

Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone - Enclosure Disassembly

For the purposes of this teardown, we estimate unit shipments for the SGH-a717 over the course of a 2 year production lifetime would be on an order of magnitude around 2.2 million units.

As a reminder, volume production assumptions are not meant to be necessarily arket accurate? but are meant primarily to be used for our cost analysis in terms of amortized NRE and tooling costs, especially for custom components specific to the model being analyzed (mechanical components especially).

ISuppli?E Design Forecast Tool (DFT) and Market Shares

As part of iSuppli Design Forecast Tool (DFT), we forecast handset shipments by major design feature and manufacture, as well as the number of design starts a manufacturer will have by feature set.

From our Design Forecast Tool (DFT), unit shipments of approximately 11 million units in 2007, growing to 28 million units in 2008, with Samsung shipping about 2 of the 11 million units total in 2007, and nearly 5 of the 28 million total units shipped in 2008, slightly above Motorola?E figures for the same segment.

Function / Performance

No testing was performed on this unit.

Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone Cost Analysis

Main Cost Drivers Representing ~69% of total materials cost as follows :

Qualcomm HSDPA 1.8 MSM6275 Chipset

Qualcomm - MSM6275 - Baseband Processor - Single Chip, Quad-Band GSM/GPRS, GPS, UMTS, HSDPA 1.8Mbps & Bluetooth

Qualcomm - RTR6250 - RF Transceiver - ZIF, Quad-Band GSM/GPRS Transceiver and Tri-Band UMTS 800/1900/2100MHz Transmitter

Qualcomm - RFR6202 - RF Receiver - ZIF, Dual Band UMTS 800/1900MHz

Qualcomm - PM6650 - Power Management IC

Qualcomm ?RFL6202 - Amplifier - LNA, Dual, UMTS 800/2100MHz

Displays

Primary Display Module - 2.6' Diagonal, 262K Color TFT, 240 x 320 Pixels

Secondary Display Module - 2 Color OLED Display Unit w/ Integral Metal Back Plate

Camera Module

Camera Module - 2.0MP, CMOS, 1/4' Format - Fixed Lens

Memory

Samsung - K5D1G13DCM-D090 - MCP - 1Gb NAND Flash + 512Mb Mobile SDRAM

Battery

Samsung - AB603443AA - 3.7V, 1000mAh

Other Items

Bluetooth Module - V2.0+EDR, Contains Broadcom BCM2045

Samsung Electro-Mechanics - PCB -10-Layer - FR4/RCF HDI, 2+6+2, Lead-Free

$1.99. - Enclosure, Main, Bottom

Charger - 5V, 700mA

Yamaha - YMU787B - FM Sound Synthesizer

Enclosure, Display, Top Cover

TriQuint Semiconductor - TQM7M5003 - PAM - Quad-Band, GSM/GPRS/EDGE

Materials and Manufacturing ~$125

What Is Not Included in our Cost Analysis

The total materials and manufacturing costs reported in this analysis reflect ONLY the direct materials cost (from component vendors and assorted EMS providers), AND manufacturing with basic test. Not included in this analysis are costs above and beyond the material manufacture of the core device itself, cost of intellectual property, royalties and licensing fees (those not already included into the per component price), software, software loading and test, shipping, logistics marketing and other channel costs including not only EMS provider and the OEM's margin, but that of other resellers. Our cost analysis is meant to focus on those costs incurred in the manufacture of the core device and exceptionally in some circumstances the packaging and literature as well.

Manufacturing Notes

Samsung Relationships / Manufacturing

Based on our research, Samsung makes all their mobile phones in house. About 70% of their products are made in Korea and 30% are made in lower cost countries such as China and India.

Country of Origin / EMS provider

This product is labeled as Made in Korea, furthermore, we have assumed that for this model, that PCB was also populated in Korea, and that custom mechanicals (plastics and metals) were also sourced domestically in Korea.

Country of origin assumptions relate directly to the associated cost of manufacturing, where calculated by iSuppli. In the cases of 'Finished' sub-assemblies (such as Bluetooth modules or camera modules), we do not calculate internal manufacturing costs, but rather assess the market price of the finished product in which case country of origin assumptions may or may not have a direct effect on pricing.

Remember also that labor rates are applied directly only to hand inserted components and systems in our bill of materials, and although regional assumptions do, these new rates do not have a direct effect on our modeled calculations of placement costs for automated SMD assembly lines. Auto-inserted components (such as SMT components) placement costs are calculated by an iSuppli algorithm which allocates a cost per component based on the size and pincount of the device. This calculation is affected by country or region of origin as well.

Design for Manufacturing / Device Complexity

The Samsung SGH-A717, similar to the SGH-A707, has a relatively high components count at 837 total and 133 mechanical. While a similar Motorola V3xx (Motorola tends to have high components count) has only 808 total and 137 mechanical components, the SGH-A717seems really high in components count. However, looking back to the analysis we did on the SGH-A707 which had a total components count of 870 and a mechanical count of 143 which did not even accounts for the subcomponents of the display module (in the SGH-A717 we did take into account the display subcomponents), the SGH-A717 has certainly improved.

The number of mechanical components usually is a direct driver of hand-assembly costs, whereas the electronic component count (and I/O count, density, etc.) are relative metrics for the more automated portion (namely SMT assembly) of manufacturing costs.

Component counts have a direct bearing on the overall manufacturing cycle times and costs, and also can increase or decrease overall yields and re-work. Our calculations of manufacturing costs factor counts and more qualitative complexities in the design. The cost of manufacturing is also, to some extent, decreased in this case because of assumed labor rate applied for China.

Note that manual labor has a much smaller effect on auto-insertion assembly lines (for the Main PCB, for example), where manufacturing costs are much more capital equipment intensive and driven by these investment costs.

Design notes

Basically the design of the SGH-A717 is the same as the previously analyzed SGH-A707.

The core design is based on Qualcomm MSM6275 chipset and includes the MSM6275 itself, PM6650 power management IC, RFR6202 RF Receiver (Dual Band UMTS 800/1900MHz), and the RTR6250 RF Transceiver ?(Quad-Band GSM/GPRS Transceiver and Tri-Band UMTS 800/1900/2100MHz Transmitter). In many of the 3G phones we have seen, especially in Samsungs and other relatively small manufacturer?E designs, Qualcomm has been a prime player in baseband and RF section due to its relatively simple reference designs and highly integrated single-chip baseband chips.

The PA section features two Avago UMTS power amps, and a TriQuint Quad-Band GSM/GPRS/EDGE solution.

The memory section is yet another NOR-less design from Samsung. This has become the design standard for Samsung handsets.

Here is a summary of the major components used in the Samsung SGH-a707 design:

Main PCB Baseband

• Baseband - Qualcomm - MSM6275 - Single Chip, Quad-Band GSM/GPRS, GPS, UMTS, HSDPA & Bluetooth

Battery / Power Management

• Power Management IC - Qualcomm - PM6650

Memory

• MCP - Samsung - K5D1G13DCM-D090 - 1Gb NAND Flash + 512Mb Mobile SDRAM

RF/PA

• RF Receiver - Qualcomm - RFR6202 - ZIF, Dual Band UMTS 800/1900MHz
• Amplifier / LNA - Qualcomm - RFL6202 - Dual, UMTS 800/1900MHz
• RF Transceiver - Qualcomm - RTR6250 - ZIF, Quad-Band GSM/GPRS Transceiver and Tri-Band UMTS 800/1900/2100MHz Transmitter
• PAM (UMTS) 850/1900 - Avago - WS2111/WS2411
• PAM (GSM) - TriQuint Semiconductor - TQM7M5003 - Quad-Band, GSM/GPRS/EDGE

User Interface

• Bluetooth V2.0+EDR Module ?Manufacturer Unknown ?Contains Broadcom BCM2045
• FM Sound Synthesizer - Yamaha - YMU787B

Camera Module

• Module - Manufacturer Unknown
• Image sensor - Samsung - S5K4BAFX - 2.0 MP, CMOS, 1/4' Format ?2.25 um x 2.25 um Pixel Size, 3.60mm x 2.70mm Active Image Area

Display Module

• Primary - 2.6' Diagonal, 262K Color TFT, 240 x 320 Pixels
• Secondary ?2-Color OLED Display Unit w/ Integral Metal Back Plate

Samsung SGH-A717 Mobile Phone - Box Contents