Chavez launches $15 mobile phone with a name to make his mother blush

[Christa]

It is perhaps the world's cheapest mobile phone. It is the latest offering from Hugo Chavez's socialist revolution. And its name is derived from a slang word for penis. Behold the Vergatorio.

Venezuela's president launched the handset on his TV show with a Mother's Day call to his mum and predicted it would conquer all rivals. "This telephone will be the biggest seller not only in Venezuela but the world," he said. "Whoever doesn't have a Vergatario is nothing," he joked.

Priced just $15 (nearly £10), the phone has a camera, WAP internet access, FM radio and MP3 and MP4 players for music and videos. And it has that name.

Why the president chose it remains unclear, but he enunciates each syllable with a grin. Some laugh, others are affronted.

Verga is slang for penis and vergatario is a newly minted word which signifies excellent but retains connotations from its root.

The word verga, and variations of it, are associated with Venezuela's second city, Maracaibo. Residents are famous for swearing and using Spanish verbal constructions uncommon in the rest of Venezuela.

/snip

A government subsidy which cut the retail price to a quarter of the manufacturing cost is likely to make the Vergatario an immediate hit. There is a waiting list for the first 10,000 units expected to be released this week.

Production this year has been set at 600,000, rising to 2m in 2011, when the government hopes to export the model to the Caribbean and then further afield.

Parts are imported from China and assembled in a factory in western Venezuela run by a new company, Vetelca, 85% owned by the Venezuelan state and 15% by the Chinese company ZTE.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/11/chavez-venezuela-mobile-phone-vergatorio

Never mind the name, kudos to Chavez for this enterprise to boost his country's economy.

[AllieB]

1. You said the magic word: Chavez

:popcorn:

[Christa]

2. Hey

I like a rebel :evilgrin:

[drm604]

3. But what is the cost of service?

The cost of the phone is secondary. Mine was "free" if I signed up for two years of service. Of course that just means that they spread the cost of the phone over those two years.

Is this phone really that cheap or do you pay for it with higher fees?

[Stevenmarc]

4. Yeah but when is the iVerga comming.

[MellowDem]

5. I'm just wondering

how a government subsidised phone will boost the country's economy? Especially when the money covering the cost of 3/4 of the phone is pretty much just oil money. The only thing that can boost Venezuela's economy right now is a rise in gas prices.

Kudos for making a phone halfway affordable, but with only 600,000 this year, it won't be widely available.