“Rip-Off-Britain” is an oft-used saying by journalists in the UK. Its time for Origamiportal.com to use the term too. Stand by.
In the US, the Medion UMPC is being sold for $1000. In Germany, its getting a 30% price premium but in the UK its going on sale for a unnecesary $1572 (£799) that’s 57% more than in the US and double what Arima, the OEM, were expecting.
This is just anoother example of Rip-Off-Britain [we feel like proper journalists now - ed.] If Arima where expecting them to sell for $800 then they’re probably knocking them out for $700 to Medion. The average markup on a US consumer notebook PC is around 5%. We expect the markup for UMPCs is something like 25% but can someone please tell us why Medion expect to slap what appears to be a 100% mark-up on the unit in the UK.
In addition to this sneeky move, Medion have also decided not to mention the docking station, just like in the US. In fact on the German website, where the docking station was previously listed, it has been removed along with the Nero DVD software package. So not only do they want to charge Europeans between 30% and 57% more but they’re not even going to throw in the docking station. That’s just a kick-in-the-nuts too much. Is anyone going to buy a UMPC that’s got DVDMaker and WindowsMovieMaker blocked, appears not to be able to play videos though Origami Experience and Windows Media Center and doesn’t include the Docking station.
Our advise is to the Brits is to think about a shopping weekend in New York and make contact with someone over there through the forums! Send a postcard to Medion and VIA while you’re there.
