{"id":11730,"date":"2025-04-11T20:12:09","date_gmt":"2025-04-11T20:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/11730\/"},"modified":"2025-04-11T20:12:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-11T20:12:09","slug":"pimax-uses-software-subscription-to-absorb-costs-in-response-to-us-china-trade-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/11730\/","title":{"rendered":"Pimax Uses Software Subscription to Absorb Costs in Response to US-China Trade War"},"content":{"rendered":"

China-based PC VR headset creator Pimax has issued a statement addressing the impact of the recent US\u2013China trade war on its operations, particularly concerning its Crystal Super VR headset<\/a>. It\u2019s going to be slightly more expensive for US-based customers, but Pimax\u2019s recent subscription-based payment structure seems to be offsetting much of the costs.<\/p>\n

Announced back in April 2024, Crystal Super is the company\u2019s next flagship PC VR headset<\/a>, offering a base 57 PPD version with QLED panels that features a resolution of 3,840 x 3,840 pixels per eye and a 120-degree field-of-view (FOV). It\u2019s still only available in pre-order, although shipping is expected to start soon.<\/p>\n

At the time of this writing, the US has levied a 145% tariff on all goods manufactured in China<\/a>. This is bad news for XR headset creators the world over, as China is by far the segment\u2019s largest manufacturing hub. And Shanghai-based Pimax is seemingly the first of the bunch to announce price changes in response.<\/p>\n

Pimax released a blogpost<\/a> wherein it describes just what\u2019s happening to US-based customers in relation to new tariffs. And it\u2019s not as bad as you\u2019d think.<\/p>\n

The company says all US orders of Crystal Super placed before February 4th, 2025 will not include any extra tariff costs, however they may face a delay of about 20 days due to bulk shipments to US-based warehouses.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Pimax Crystal Super | Image courtesy Pimax<\/p>\n

Orders placed between February 4th and April 10th will include a $75 \u2018Regional Surcharge\u2019 however, which Pimax says partially offsets increased shipping and logistics costs.<\/p>\n

Moreover, starting April 10th, all new US orders will carry a $95 surcharge, with shipments expected to begin in June. Pimax says it\u2019s also establishing a factory in Delaware to handle final assembly.<\/p>\n

That said, the overall price of Crystal Super isn\u2019t really changing. Pimax has now updated its pricing structure, and although it\u2019s become less straight forward\u00a0following the rollout of its subscription-based software pricing<\/a>, it\u2019s actually helping to offset tariff-related costs.<\/p>\n

Now, the base price of Pimax Crystal Super has been lowered to $799, with the remaining $885 payable later through Pimax Play with Prime\u2014a total cost $1,684 (excl. US-only $95 surcharge).<\/p>\n

For everyone else around the globe, it\u2019s essentially a nominal change. Previously, Crystal Super was priced at\u00a0$999 with the remaining Prime subscription costing $696\u2014total cost $1,695. You\u2019ll now see that local pricing has be updated<\/a> to reflect the lower upfront cost.<\/p>\n

Notably, the company highlights that its 14-day trial period is still in place. For users outside the US, this could make Crystal Super slightly more attractive than before, as it requires less upfront money down\u2014still refundable if you send it back before the trial period ends and you need Prime to continue using it.<\/p>\n

That said, Pimax is in a unique position to rebalance its costs by leveraging its expensive, but now extremely useful subscription model. The same can\u2019t be said for platform holders like Meta, which already subsidize hardware in effort to make software more attractive.<\/p>\n

While Meta hasn\u2019t announced any price hikes, the company has actually raised headsets prices in the past, with the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the company to temporarily raise the price of Quest 2 from $300 to $400<\/a>\u00a0back in 2022. So, we\u2019ll just have to wait and see.<\/p>\n

\u2013 \u2013 \u2014 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll be following the effects of US-China trade war tariffs on XR hardware closely, so check back soon for more.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"China-based PC VR headset creator Pimax has issued a statement addressing the impact of the recent US\u2013China trade…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11731,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3162],"tags":[53,16,15,3243,3244],"class_list":{"0":"post-11730","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-virtual-reality","8":"tag-technology","9":"tag-uk","10":"tag-united-kingdom","11":"tag-virtual-reality","12":"tag-vr"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114321158516073769","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}