Essential phone slashes price by $200

Essential has slashed the price of its eponymous phone down to $499, a $200 price cut from the original $699 price, less than two months after it began shipping to customers. This move may be a signal that it wasn’t selling well at $699, especially given that the only US carrier stores it’s available in have “Sprint” above the door. Another reason is that it now has to face the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL head-to-head. Of course, that’s not how Essential sees it, saying that the price drop…