It is the same reason MRI machines are expensive. The research and development was really expensive and they don’t make many of them. They have to be expensive to break-even. And I don’t think the Segway would really catch on even if the price was lower. So economies of scale wouldn’t really come into play. edit :: More specifically, nothing inside a Segway is expensive to make. It is just expensive to only make a 1000 of them.