15 percent of Samsung’s management left the company late last year following its dismal smartphone sales, according to a new report from Korea-based news outlet Yonhap News.
The tech giant had 1,219 management staff on its books as of 2014’s Q3 — only for this number to fall by 177 people by the end of the year. 44 of the 177 people who resigned or were fired were from Samsung’s IT & Mobile Communications department.
Ouch!
Having spent more than a year throwing smartwatch concepts a wall, only to discover that very few of them stick, Samsung’s taking a bit of a break from the wearables game.
But a newly-unearthed patent suggests that the South Korean tech giant could come back with a vengeance, thanks to a ripoff Apple concept bold new interface design based around an iPod-style rotating bezel. The idea would be that this rotating bezel could allow users to scroll through different apps, lists and menus without having to obscure the miniature display with their finger.
So, yeah, it’s basically the Apple Watch’s digital crown idea — only “different” enough to not be a direct analog.
Samsung might finally be kicked the curb when it comes to who gets the lion’s share of Apple’s chipmaking business. According to analysts Olivia and Rick Hsu from Daiwa Securities, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) is likely to snap up 70 percent of all Apple’s A9 and A9X orders, leaving rival chipmaker Samsung out in the (relative) cold.
The reason for this is reportedly the “superior yield” and “manufacturing excellence in mass-production” exhibited by TSMC, which will get it a large percentage of the A9 orders, and all of the A9x orders for the next generation iPad.
Now that we know more about the long-awaited Apple Watch, it’s time to find out how it stacks up against Google’s Android Wear platform and the growing number of wearables that support it.
There are lots of similarities between the two, but there also some big differences in software, hardware, and price that will likely help you decide which one is right for you.
Of the smartphone stories which played out in 2014, two of the biggest were the triumph of Apple’s iPhone 6, which sold a massive 10 million+ units in its opening weekend alone, and the faltering of Samsung, which fell from the dominant position it had enjoyed since 2011.
Today, a new report from Gartner (paywall) breaks down both the 1.2 billion smartphone sales that took place worldwide last year, and also the sales from Q4 2014 — revealing how Apple leaped ahead in the smartphone category, while the South Korean tech giant Samsung started to lose its footing.
Make no mistake about it: this was the year everything changed.
We get slammed 24/7 with new Apple rumors. Some are accurate, most are not. To give you a clue about what’s really coming out of Cupertino in the future, we’re busting out our rumor debunker each week to blow up the nonsense.
This week the Apple Watch rumors have reached a crescendo as invites to a not-so-mysterious event in March were released. Will the Apple Watch really launch with 100,000 apps? Will demand for the gold Apple Watch wreak havoc on the world’s gold supply? And don’t forget about the Apple car either. New rumors are claiming Samsung could be the biggest boost or roadblock for project Titan.
Find out the truth behind the week’s wildest Apple rumors below:
The iPad might be the king of tablets when it comes to quality, but it is no longer the king when it comes to sales.
A new report from research firm Strategy Analytics says that the iPad is now being outsold by so-called Brand X tablets: generic tablets sold under any brand name that isn’t Apple or Samsung.
People hoping that Apple will drop the Samsung albatross from around its neck for the forthcoming iPhone 6s may be disappointed.
According to a new report coming from the Asian supply chain, Samsung has come to an agreement with Apple to supply new 20nm LPDDR4 DRAM memory chips for the next generation iPhone, expected this September. Samsung will reportedly provide half of the chips Apple needs for its next iPhone, and has no problems upping the order if more are required.
It was only a matter of time before Samsung did something to try and thwart Apple’s unconfirmed automotive aspirations.
The Korean iPhone competitor has bought the battery pack division of a leading automative supplier only a couple of weeks after it was reported that Apple had met with the company.
Apple is continuing to provide credible reasons that it may be working on an electric vehicle, as a new report suggests that Cupertino is in the midst of hiring away battery experts from major companies involved with the car industry.
The latest company to be allegedly targeted? None other than longtime Apple rival, Samsung.
Samsung has bought its own Apple Pay competitor with LoopPay, a U.S. startup that makes cases and accessories for wirelessly transmitting card data with a magnetic signal.
First rumored back in December, Samsung will allegedly integrate LoopPay’s technology into its upcoming phones in an effort to ride the growing mobile payments trend created by Apple Pay.
Unlike Apple, which is more comfortable (and lucrative) than ever with its business strategy, here in 2015 Samsung is having a bit of an identity crisis. Is it a freedom-fighting Internet of Things company making smart refrigerators and connected TVs? Is it a Xiaomi competitor, turning out cheaper smartphones than ever for the developing Indian market?
Like a deer in headlights, the company seems to be skittishly veering from one idea to the next, without any real understanding of what it needs to do to once again be competitive.
Of course, there is one idea that has worked for Samsung in the past, and with its mobile division falling on hard times, that strategy seems to be one the South Korean tech giant is more than happy to return to: copying Apple.
Things aren’t looking too rosy for Samsung at the moment. Having seen profits slip due to its falling mobile sales, the flailing South Korean tech giant is reportedly considering throwing in the towel altogether in Japan, where it’s struggling more than elsewhere.
Samsung currently represents a miniscule 4 percent of the Japanese smartphone market, which puts it in sixth place. According to sources with Samsung, staying in Japan is actually losing rather than gaining the company money.
While Samsung hasn’t traditionally been a top-seller in Japan, here in 2015 it’s doing worse than ever: with the company’s favorite metric, marketshare, shrinking from 17 percent two years ago to low single digits today.
Knowing how much is at stake, things can get pretty vicious when you’re a manufacturer with a shot at providing Apple with vital components for its next generation iPhone.
We’ve known for some time that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. and Samsung have been battling it out over who gets picked by Apple to make its forthcoming A9 processors — with Samsung apparently having the advantage currently, due to offering Apple a better deal financially.
TSMC isn’t taking this lying down, however. In fact, the company is currently suing an ex-employee who allegedly leaked R&D secrets to Samsung; thereby allowing it to both catch up in the chip fabrication business.
Apple has been trying to wean itself from being dependent on Samsung’s smartphone components for years, but breaking up is proving nearly impossible to do.
According to a report from Recode, Apple is turning back to Samsung to make the next-generation A9 processors that will make their way into the iPhone and iPad later this year.
In public, the big smartphone competition may be between Apple and Samsung, but behind the scenes the faltering Samsung has another battle on its hands: with rival manufacturer TSMC over who gets to build the A9 processor for the next generation iPhone.
And while Samsung is decisively losing the battle to sell the most smartphones in the marketplace, the A9 chip orders could be one clash it is going to emerge victorious from!
Apple enjoyed historic sales this holiday season, and while the company won’t reveal its official earnings until January 27th, based on the latest smartphone activation report from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, Apple dominated the holiday shopping season and accounted for 50% of all smartphone activations in Q4 2014.
Tim Cook is likely to announce another record breaking quarter as Apple nearly doubled the number of activations of its closest competitor Samsung, which accounted for a modest 26% of the market.
Check out the surprising graph below:
Thanks to Apple’s continued success in Japan, and Tim Cook’s big push to expand into China, everyone forgets about one of the most revealing markets the iPhone 6 has scored big in: South Korea. Why is South Korea so revealing? Because it’s none other than the stomping ground of longtime Apple rival, Samsung.
According to a report published Wednesday by Counterpoint Research, Apple is now firmly challenging Samsung in its home ground — with market share in the country rising to 33 percent, from less than 15 percent, based on the success of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Samsung’s market share meanwhile plummeted from 60 percent to 46 percent.
Ever since Tim Cook unveiled the Apple Watch last September, it’s been one disappointment after another as far as I’m concerned. Apple’s first wearable won’t come in the minimalist form factor of the fitness bracelets I love. Worse yet, the launch version of the fashion-forward device will lack GPS, suffer from underwhelming battery life and fail to offer truly native third-party apps.
For the first time, I realized I would not be buying an Apple product when it first hit the market. “It’s not worth lining up for,” I told my dad when he asked what I thought after the Apple Watch’s big reveal.
But a funny thing happened on the way to Apple Watch’s launch day, which is coming sometime this spring. And I’m not talking about the previously unthinkable — an Apple fan calling the Microsoft Band the best smartwatch on the planet. No, I’m talking about wading through an ungodly sea of really bad smartwatches at International CES earlier this month and seeing indisputable proof of just how innovative and disruptive Apple Watch actually will be.
The year is 2018. After a long day at work, you pull into your driveway, whip out your iPhone 10 Plus and say, “Siri, I’m home.”
Your garage door opens silently, beckoning you to enter the ultra-connected smart home of the future.
As you walk in, your lights turn on. The wife used to get on you about leaving the lights on, but her nagging feels like a distant memory now. Your thermostat cools everything down to a comfortable 69 degrees. Knowing that you pulled into the driveway two minutes ago, your oven has started preheating itself. You usually fix dinner for yourself on Thursdays, so it’s time for frozen pizza.
It’s not exactly news that Samsung would like be a whole lot more like Apple. And when you compare the sales figures from Samsung’s ailing mobile division to Apple’s thriving iPhone numbers, who can blame it?
But while the South Korea-based tech giant isn’t going to be able to steal away any of the design brains behind Apple’s must-have devices any time soon, it’s trying to do the next best thing: hiring a former boss from the company Jony Ive helped start before he set sale for Apple in the 1990s.
LAS VEGAS — Walk the halls of the massive International CES trade show and you’ll be bombarded by an outrageous number of pitches for products with radical new features.
You can glimpse the shiny happy future of consumer electronics at the show, although some of the innovations on display are clearly destined for the dustbin of gadget history.
At the biggest booths, reps for big companies like Sony and Samsung — but, sadly, not Apple — talk up the latest additions to their product lines. At smaller booths, inventors show off prototypes for products that may not ever roll off an assembly line. There’s a nonstop blitz of “world’s first” products.
It’s impossible to see everything, but it’s a blast trying. Here are Cult of Mac’s picks for the best of CES 2015, from Lightning-enabled headphones and massive TVs to drones and self-adjusting belts.
Samsung reportedly has Apple’s blessing to manufacture the processors for the Apple Watch, which will be allegedly be made using the company’s 28nm process technology.
The order would come at just the right time for Samsung, which recently announced another quarter of poor earnings: giving it its first annual profit decline since 2011.
With Samsung’s mobile division in the toilet, the company needs to focus on other areas, like securing orders for chip fabrication.
2014 wasn’t a great year in Samsung land. The company has just issued its earnings guidance for the year’s fourth quarter — and the news isn’t good.
With operating profit standing at 5.2 trillion won (around $4.74 billion) for the quarter, the company’s overall profit for the year will likely come in at 25 trillion won: its lowest figure in three years.
LAS VEGAS — The first full day of CES if starting to wrap up and if there’s one trend starting to emerge, it’s that there are no trends. Nowhere was this more apparent than Samsung’s keynote, where the company threw everything and the kitchen sink into its announcement of new home appliances, a vacuum, a Virtual Reality service called Milk, a cute portable SSD, and of course, one of the craziest TVs we’ve ever seen.
Dropping ridiculous TVs has become something of a tradition for Samsung at CES, and this year is no different with the SUHD S9W TV that’s touted as ‘the most seductive TV ever made.’ It’s just too bad you’ll never get to use their beautiful gimmick.
