bq27x00 21V PGM: for reduced cost?

Hi,

I would like to ask a question on bq27x00 and bq262xx series.

I noted that bq27x00 have [Pin 10, PGM] for EEPROM programming voltage supply which is absent in other ICs. Flash and EEPROM uses essentially the same principle that they both applies electrical voltage for programming and erasing, with the only difference that EEPROM can erase single bit while FLASH erases larger blocks of bits per time. No matter either Flash or EEPROM is used, the voltage needs to be generated internally on bq262xx chips, and I wonder if this is one of the factors contribute to their higher price than bq27x00, in addition to other factors such as technology advancement?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory

Internal charge pumps

Despite the need for high programming and erasing voltages, virtually all flash chips today require only a single supply voltage, and produce the high voltages via on-chip charge pumps.

Zheng