Will Samsung gain share from Apple after Galaxy S8 launch?

Smartphone share in 2016
The global smartphone industry is debating whether Samsung can regain its lost market share from Apple — after the launch of Galaxy S8.

Samsung lost share and top rank in Q4

Samsung lost its number one status in the global smartphone market in Q4 2016 — to arch rival Apple.

Samsung’s smartphone share fell to 17.8 percent in Q4 2016 from 20.7 percent in Q4 2015, according to Gartner. On the other hand, Apple increased its smartphone share to 17.9 percent from 17.7 percent.
Smartphone share in Q4 2016David McQueen, research director at ABI Research, said the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+ phones stand as worthy upgrades to their predecessors, showcasing an extremely tactile feature in the use of the Infinity Screen and enhanced interactivity with the devices through the use of both smart biometrics and Bixby, its own vision of intelligent mobile interaction.

Samsung is not the first

ABI Research said Samsung may not necessarily have been first to market with a number of these latest functionalities that it has packed into its phones. The smartphone company is now very much back on track to help usher in a new era of smartphone design and interfaces that can help stimulate the replacement market once more.

After the torrid time Samsung had with the Note 7 and the delay of its new flagship models beyond Mobile World Congress, the company needed to boost its smartphone offering in an effort to win back consumer trust while leaving the past firmly behind.

Galaxy S8 launch

South Korean giant Samsung on Wednesday said its Galaxy S8 has a voice assistant.

The device comes in two variants with different screen sizes — the 5.8-inch Galaxy S8 and 6.2-inch Galaxy S8 Plus – and will be available from April 21. Registrations begin from March 30. The device might be priced from $720 (approximately Rs 47,000).

Samsung will release these devices in India in the coming months.

Samsung also revealed Bixby, a smart voice assistant to rival Apple’s Siri and Google’s Assistant. With a perfect amalgam of voice, vision and touch, Bixby can search restaurants, take screenshots and even book a cab for you.

The technology giant has used the best hardware and provided the best features available to date in the device.

The device has a bezel-less curved edge “infinity display” covered with pristine glass and a 12MP rear camera with multi-frame processing and optical image stabilisation. It has an 8MP auto-focus front shooter.

The device is IP68 rated, meaning it is water and dust resistant. The company has also upped the security feature with iris scanner, face recognition and fingerprint scanner – moved to the back of the device – to unlock the device.

The home button has been shifted beneath the “infinity display”.

Available in five different colours, the device has a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 Octa core (2.35 GHz Quad + 1.7 GHZ Quad) processor. For models that will be available in countries other than the US, Samsung has used Exynos Octa core (2.35 GHz Quad + 1.9 GHZ Quad) processor.

While Galaxy S8 comes with a 3,000 mAh battery, the Galaxy S8 Plus is fitted with 3,500 mAh battery pack. The devices run on Android 7.0 Nougat and have USB-C and 3.5mm headphone jacks.

The company also launched Samsung Connect app that would allow users to control a number of internet-connected home devices such as TVs or refrigerators. It also unveiled new Gear 360 camera.

Samsung in early months

There’s a lot riding on Samsung S8 devices due to the Galaxy Note 7 fiasco. Samsung ultimately killed that smartphone after two recalls, both related to issues with faulty batteries.

Earlier this month, Samsung launched two new smartphones in Galaxy A series — 5.7-inch Galaxy A7 and 5.2-inch Galaxy A5 in India which were priced at Rs 33,490 and Rs 28,990, respectively.

Samsung also joined the ‘go digital’ bandwagon, and last week unveiled Samsung Pay, the company’s flagship mobile payments service, in India.

At MWC in Barcelona this year, Samsung announced its “I&G (Infill & Growth) Project” for Reliance Jio Infocomm that will help expand both the current network capacity as well as network coverage, IANS reports.

Baburajan K