Tag Archive for 'Samsung'

The Personal Computer Is Dead

Published on November 30, 2011 in High Tech & Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Power is fast shifting from end users and software developers to operating system vendors.

The PC is dead. Rising numbers of mobile, lightweight, cloud-centric devices don’t merely represent a change in form factor. Rather, we’re seeing an unprecedented shift of power from end users and software developers on the one hand, to operating system vendors on the other—and even those who keep their PCs are being swept along. This is a little for the better, and much for the worse [Source].

The transformation is one from product to service. The platforms we used to purchase every few years—like operating systems—have become ongoing relationships with vendors, both for end users and software developers. Jonathan Zittrain wrote about this impending shift, driven by a desire for better security and more convenience, in my 2008 book The Future of the Internet—and How to Stop It.

HTC’s Anti-Apple Strategy Wins U.S. Market

Published on November 10, 2011 in High Tech & Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

HTC has become the top seller of smartphones in the U.S. with a strategy that’s precisely the opposite of Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s. Where Apple is secretive, HTC is open. Where Apple is exclusive, HTC works with all carriers. Where Apple is proprietary, HTC is collaborative. Where Apple customizes for no one, HTC customizes for everyone. It’s the anti-Apple and, so far, it has worked.

By quickly incorporating the latest technologies and customizing phones for customers, Chou has forged ties to more than 100 wireless operators on six continents. The company has climbed to the No. 4 position in smartphones globally, behind Samsung, Apple and Nokia.

The question is whether HTC can stay on top. Chou has benefited as people trade in traditional phones, used primarily for voice calls and texting, for smartphones, which can download apps and surf the Web. Carriers scrambling to keep up with demand such as Verizon Wireless and Sprint turned to HTC for smartphones that use Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android software during the almost four years AT&T had exclusive U.S. rights to the iPhone [Source].

Samsung’s new phones will have flexible screens

Published on October 30, 2011 in High Tech & Media. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Samsung‘s new mobile device lineup will feature flexible screens starting in 2012, the company announced today.

In its quarterly earnings call, Samsung’s vice president of investor relations, Robert Yi, told investors, analysts and press, “The flexible display we are looking to introduce sometime in 2012, hopefully the earlier part. The application probably will start from the handset side.”

After flexible-screen mobile phones roll out, the company plans to introduce the same technology for tablets and other devices.

In January 2011, Samsung purchased Liquivista, a strategic acquisition that will allow it to produce the kinds of displays that were announced today. Liquivista made electrowetting display technology, which is used to create mobile and other consumer electronic displays that are bright, low-power, flexible and transparent [Source].

That was fast: Samsung topples Apple as top smartphone maker

Published on October 29, 2011 in High Tech & Media. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Samsung has now become the world’s largest smartphone manufacturer, leaping past Apple, which held the title for just one quarter.

For Samsung, success not only came from Android, but also from Bada, its platform for inexpensive smartphones. In August, Bada appeared to be selling better than Windows Phone worldwide. Those numbers will only continue to rise for Samsung.

In July, we reported that Apple’s smartphone sales surpassed those of Nokia, the former leader, making it the No. 1 smartphone maker for several months. But Apple’s lead slipped due to the delayed launch of the iPhone 4S and the introduction of strong Samsung entries like the Galaxy S II.

Overall, global smartphone shipments grew 44 percent over last year to reach 117 million units. Samsung saw the biggest growth over the past year — it only shipped 7.5 million smartphones last year — while Nokia, unsurprisingly, fell the most, from 26.5 million smartphones shipped last year to 16.8 million this year [Source].

Amazon, the Company That Ate the World

Published on October 25, 2011 in Global Strategy. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Jeff Bezos’ new tablet, the Kindle Fire, is cheap, pretty, and puts Amazon in perfect position to take a bite out of Apple—and every online transaction you make.

Jeff Bezos is channeling Apple. It’s mid-September and the wiry billionaire founder of Amazon.com (AMZN) is at his brand-new corporate headquarters in Seattle, in a building named Day One South after his conviction that 17-year-old Amazon is still in its infancy. Almost giddy with excitement, Bezos retrieves one by one the new crop of dirt-cheap Kindle e-readers—they start at $79—from a hidden perch on a chair tucked into a conference room table. When he’s done showing them off, he stands up, and, for an audience of a single journalist, announces, “Now, I’ve got one more thing to show you.” He waits a half-beat to make sure the reference to Jobs’s famous line from Apple (AAPL) presentations hasn’t been missed, then gives his notorious barking laugh. With that, Bezos pulls out the Kindle Fire, Amazon’s long-anticipated tablet computer—and the first credible response to the Apple iPad [Read more].

Samsung: The next big bet

Published on October 9, 2011 in Emerging Markets and Global Strategy. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

The world’s biggest information-technology firm is diving into green technology and the health business. It should take care; its rivals should take notice.

In 2000 Samsung started making batteries for digital gadgets. Ten years later it sold more of them than any other company in the world. In 2001 it threw resources into flat-panel televisions. Within four years it was the market leader. In 2002 the firm bet heavily on “flash” memory. The technology it delivered made the iPhone and iPad a reality, and made Samsung Apple’s biggest supplier—and now its biggest hardware competitor.

The handsome payoffs from these ballsy bets made the South Korean company a colossus; last year its sales passed $135 billion. Now it is embarking on a similarly audacious plan to move away from electronics into technologies where it barely has a presence today. It intends to spend $20 billion over ten years on solar panels, light-emitting diodes (LEDs) used for lighting, electric-vehicle batteries, medical devices and biotech drugs.

These businesses shift Samsung away from easily substitutable gadgets towards more essential industrial goods (see table)—or from “infotainment” to “lifecare”, as the company puts it. Just as electronics defined swathes of the 20th century, the company believes green technology and health care will be central to the 21st [Read more].

From One-time Imitator to Pioneer

Published on September 3, 2010 in Global Strategy. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Ten years ago, Samsung’s executives poured over numbers and set their 2010 sales goal at $140 billion — four times the amount in 2000. Sales will reach that level this year, according to the median estimate of 21 analysts — right on target. The company is aiming to increase revenue again — this time more than tripling it from 2009 to $400 billion by 2020.

Samsung Electronics has already taken giant steps from its early days as a copycat appliance manufacturer. Now, as a consumer electronics behemoth, it has expanded beyond South Korea and the nation’s industrial, conglomerate-run shipyards, steel mills and auto plants.

“Samsung today is in an incredible position to create the evolution of consumer electronics,” says Shaun Cochran, who heads Korean research at brokerage CLSA Asia-Pacific, which rates Samsung Electronics a “buy.” To be successful, Samsung — a company with a history of top-down managers and obedient employees — will need to shift strategy, a process for which it has few guideposts.

For the one-time imitator to become a pioneer, hitting the numbers will be just the beginning [Source 1] [Source 2].

Samsung Shifts Strategy to Challenge Apple

Published on August 31, 2010 in Global Strategy. 0 Comments Tags: .

“The global list of top companies is being replaced by the likes of Apple, Google and Facebook,” says Choi Gee Sung, 59, who — in a partial nod to the recently relaxed dress code — is tieless in his navy-blue pinstriped suit and white shirt with light-blue stripes for his first interview since becoming chief executive officer in December. “Our job is to prepare the organization for the next generation so it can continue to evolve into a truly great company. We need to be on our toes.”

To be successful, Samsung — a company with a history of top-down managers and obedient employees — will need to shift strategy, a process for which it has few guideposts. “Samsung today is in an incredible position to create the evolution of consumer electronics,” says Shaun Cochran, who heads Korean research at brokerage CLSA Asia-Pacific, which rates Samsung Electronics a “buy.” “The problem is, in a place like Apple, it’s a culture of trying to be creative as a matter of who they are. At Samsung, the way of thinking has always been, “We can do it faster, better and cheaper [Source].”

Google’s first step to conquer the mobile phone business

Published on November 5, 2007 in High Tech & Media and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

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Today Google announced the first piece of its “master plan” to enter the mobile phone market. Not with the much anticipated Gphone, but an operating system for mobile phones; Android.

Android is the first truly open and comprehensive platform for mobile devices. It includes an operating system, user-interface and applications — all of the software to run a mobile phone, but without the proprietary obstacles that have hindered mobile innovation.

Google hopes Android will power a variety of future mobile phones and boost the web on the move. Basically, it is building software to make the Internet run more easily on mobile phones.

It has been working with 30 partner companies. Including some of the world’s biggest handset makers and wireless service providers: Motorola, Samsung, LG, Qualcomm, T-Mobile, China Mobile, Telefonica, etc. Conspicuously absent are Nokia, AT&T, and Verizon, among others. (Like Apple, on whose board Google CEO Eric Schmidt sits, European mobile platform provider Symbian, Microsoft, Blackberry maker Research in Motion…)

Silicon Alley Insider has published an interesting post on four remaining questions regarding Google’s mobile ambitions. Earlier post related to Google’s latest move can be found here: Shaking up the mobile phone industry, Mobile advertising and Google OpenSocial.

Samsung on greatness in the digital era

Published on October 22, 2006 in Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: .

samsungbrandingThe fall edition of Samsung’s DigitAll magazine explores greatness in the digital era.

To understand the topic better, Greg Lindsay portrays five business leaders of companies like Ingenio, Zopa, Honest Tea, Cleantech and Firefox.

Business writer Nicholas G. Carr (blog) meanwhile explores the topic conceptually, and investigates the claim that in the Age of the Internet, greatness in business is no longer “an expression of the aptitudes of individual persons or organisations, but a consequence of the connections between them”. Carr claims there is a “fundamental flaw in the thinking of those who believe greatness emerges naturally from the interconnections of the crowd or network”, the so-called “wisdom of the crowd”.

Also nice is a story by Observer architecture critic Deyan Sudjic on how designer Ross Lovegrove “turns technology into the experience of sense”.