mwelling
commented
6 years ago We will never be able to compete with the VK-162 price.
The Neo-M8M module only consists of a portion of the cost of the system as it does not provide a built-in antenna. If we use stacked design it would block the use of an on-board antenna.
As for removing the UART header, it is funny because I was just told to add it on the revision.
1) A 1.8V GPS module, like U-Blox Neo-M8M ** This module's performance is a night and day improvement over the G.top013 you're using. 2) Stackable (including high-speed) 3) Eliminate unnecessary circuitry (level shifter, usb-to-uart debug, etc.) 4) Ability to disconnect GPIO lines that are not needed for the application so as to not interfere with stacked boards.
5) Price. I know that economies of scale aren't kicking in yet, but $75 is FAR FAR more than you can justify, especially since in the end you're competing with USB GPS modules like VK-162 (contains a u-blox chip that performs far better than adafruit/gtop) and costs about $15.
Neo-M8M price breaks are as follows;
< 10 | 33 USD 10 - 49 pcs | 19.19 USD 50 - 99 pcs | 15.78 USD 100 - 249 pcs | 12.63 USD 250 + | 8.85 USD