Hi All,
It is my understanding that it is simple a relabeled Icom radio. If it really weren't an issue for other manufacturers, one might reasonably ask why we aren't seeing D-Star radios from other manufacturers. Granted, there could be other reasons, but something is apparently keeping other manufacturers from building these radios. This means that essentially we are in a single source situation, where we can expect D-Star to remain fairly expensive. Indeed, the codec chip costs $20, but we see the price differential for these radios to be well over $100, even on an HT which is fairly expensive to begin with. That's a pretty high markup. (IC-91AD is $524, IC-91A is $408 at universal radio). The UT-118 to do an upgrade is $189. The DV- Dongle is $200.
D-STAR radio needs not only the AMBE codec chip but also linear codec, GMSK modem chip and control cpu. (see http://d-star.dyndns.org/IC-2200H/IC-2200H052.jpg UT-115 is same as UT-118.) So, I think D-STAR rig is over $100 higher than normal analog rig, (Analog part of D-STAR rig is same as normal analog rig.)
Satoshi Yasuda 7m3tjz/ad6gz