Why you should stay away from the Escobar Fold 2 i.e. the rebranded Fold

One thing I love about flexible display technology is that there are no corners to be cut. Manufacturers have to either fully commit to this concept, or they’ll quickly become irrelevant in the space. You can’t half-bake a flexible device and expect it to do well, which means that the flexible smartphone market has been, for the most part, free of gimmicks, even though failed but honest attempts might exist.With that in mind, when I first heard about a foldable device called the Escobar Fold 1 for just $349, I thought it was probably being held together by duct tape. And to be honest, since the Escobar Fold 1 was essentially a rebranded Royole FlexPai, it might as well have been.I’m being a little bit facetious, but in truth, I never gave the original Escobar Fold 1 much though because I didn’t imagine enthusiasts would rush to buy a rebranded version of an already-underwhelming device. But some tech enthusiasts, particularly YouTubers, have ordered the Escobar Fold 1 for reviewing purposes, only to be later ‘upgraded’ for free to the Escobar Fold 2 before they could ever get the first model shipped in their mailboxes. And this is where things get more interesting for us fans of the Samsung brand.The Escobar Fold 2 is a shameless unofficial Galaxy Fold rebrandThe Escobar Fold 1 never came to be, but the Escobar Fold 2 appears to have gotten a bit more attention from the media. In part, this is because the Escobar Fold 2 is essentially a shameless Galaxy Fold rebrand. It’s shameless, but the Galaxy Fold is still miles away better than the Royole FlexPai. Another reason for this newfound time in the spotlight is that the Escobar Fold 2 actually did ship to a few customers, although suspiciously enough, most happen to be reviewers, influencers and the like. How convenient…So how can this be possible? How can the Escobar Fold 2, which is essentially a rebranded Samsung Galaxy Fold, cost a fraction of the product’s original price? How can it be sold for just $399, or roughly $130 less than the bill of materials for the Galaxy S20 Ultra?At first, I thought that maybe the Fold 2 is the original Galaxy Fold that’s been recalled. I thought that maybe this company which is affiliated with the Colombian drug lord somehow got a hold of some of the recalled Galaxy Fold units and decided to sell them at a much lower price.That, however, is not the case. As seen in photos and videos floating around the web, both the Escobar Fold 2 and Galaxy Fold are essentially the same. They both have the ‘T’ shaped dust caps, and the Escobar Fold 2 has the same redesigned bits and pieces as Samsung’s final version of the Fold.Sure, the Escobar Fold 2 has a rather offputting gold wrap hiding the Samsung branding – obviously, this device is not the result of an official collab – and a mugshot of Pablo Escobar for a wallpaper,
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