According to estimates from some headphone experts, the cost of making Dre Beats headphones is less than N3,000. The company was sold to Apple in May of 2014 during a record-setting deal that included about $2.6billion in cash and approximately $400million in stock. Company founders Dr Dre – aka Andre Young – and Jimmy Iovine are now Apple employees.
Headphone designers estimate ‘the cost of making a fancy headset is as low as $14’, the New York Times reported. The least expensive pair of Beats headphones that is listed on the company’s website costs $199.99 (N39,808) and the most expensive pair retails for $699.99 (N139,333.01). Dre and Iovine created the company in the mid-2000s.
Beats grew to become worth $3.2billion after cornering 57 per cent of the market for ‘premium’ headphones, CNN reported.
Overall, the company controlled 27 per cent of the $1.8billion headphone market in 2014.
During an audio test of 18 of the top-selling headphone brands, TIME Magazine ranked Beats as the second-to-worst entry in terms of sound quality.
