Is it any better to make multiple versions of something?
If you add a $500 part to a $10k item, but charge $5000 more, when you could instead make only the high tier device for probably the same price(Economies of scale on the upgrade parts plus not having to deal with the costs of multiple SKUs), almost everyone is worse off.
The only benefit to the existence of low tier items with only small differences from high tier, that i can see, is that the used ones might get sold off cheaply and be available to the lowest income people when they upgrade.
If you add a $500 part to a $10k item, but charge $5000 more, when you could instead make only the high tier device for probably the same price(Economies of scale on the upgrade parts plus not having to deal with the costs of multiple SKUs), almost everyone is worse off.
The only benefit to the existence of low tier items with only small differences from high tier, that i can see, is that the used ones might get sold off cheaply and be available to the lowest income people when they upgrade.