At the price per kilo, atc is not expensive. Maybe the weight is the only objective parameter for a speaker.
I don't know if this is a joke or not, but in any case weight is not a reliable indicator of quality or higher manufacturing costs for multiple reasons.
1) As far as enclosure material is concerned, MDF is heavier than plywood or aluminium, but is cheaper. A well built MDF enclosure is not bad but, for a given panel rigidity, plywood or aluminium enclosures (like Genelec) will be lighter.
2) For a given BL, motors with ferrite magnets are much heavier than those equipped with neodymium magnets. The latter are much more expensive though. Nothing wrong with properly used ferrite magnets, but there are applications for which neodymium is more practical.
3) An active speaker equipped with class AB amps will require a heavier heatsink or cooling system compared to another speaker equipped with class D amps of the same power. One is not necessarily better or worse than the other. The heavier heatsink will however, all other things being equal, be more expensive.
4) When speakers of similar size, construction and design are compared, weights are mostly similar irrespectively of their price or quality.
- High quality plywood or MDF is not heavier than lower quality equivalents.
- High quality drivers are not heavier than lower quality drivers of similar design (application, size, type of magnet etc.)
- Same story for high quality amps vs lower quality amps of similar class, power, design etc.