Vertu: The Costliest Mobile Brand. What’s So Special?
Its cheapest mobile costs tens of iPhones!
How I came to know about Vertu:
The other day I was watching the movie ‘Goutham Nanda’. An amazing movie, where the hero’s family is portrayed so insanely rich that his father gets featured as one in Top 50 Richest People in the World. Everything in the movie was clear for me, except one – Why was the man still using a feature phone (of an unknown company Vertu). He could have bought an iPhone made of gold right? (It’s the same phone in the picture above)
So I googled the name ‘Vertu’ to know what the mysterious mobile phone exactly is. Here’s what I have found, which cleared all my doubts.
Firstly, Who founded the company?
Vertu was founded by Nokia in 1998, with the intention of giving big shots a shot of luxury in their mobiles. According to The Economist, the concept was to market phones explicitly as fashion accessories, with the idea —
“If you can spend $20,000 on a watch, why not on a mobile phone?”
By the end of 2013, the company had around 350,000 customers, and phones were on sale in 500 retail outlets. But now Vertu is in bankruptcy. Many of its factories are getting demolished…
