Worried about Fallout from COVID-19
Kim Hyun-suk, president and head of the Consumer Electronics Division of Samsung Electronics, predicted that the COVID-19 will wreak havoc on the global home appliance market from the fourth quarter of this year.
"Contrary to our expectations, the global market began to improve from the second quarter,” Kim said at Samsung Digital Plaza in Gangnam, Seoul on July 15. “We expect market conditions in third quarter to be good as pent-up demand will drive growth. But we expect difficulties in the fourth quarter and beyond.”
Kim said the COVID-19 outbreak has catalyzed changes in the home appliance market. For example, as people do not go to movie theaters, they prefer larger home TVs. Consumer also prefer larger refrigerators. Growing sales of vacuum cleaners and dishwashers in India and Southeast Asia, where many households have housekeepers, is also a change sparked off by the coronavirus crisis.
Kim predicted that the future home appliance market will shift to devices that can satisfy people with indirect experiences. "The spread of COVID-19 virus has made it difficult for people to travel, watch baseball games at ball parks and movies at theaters," Kim said. "Our task is to develop home appliances that help people indirectly experience these things."
Kim predicted that the technological development of the Fourth Industrial Revolution will also accelerate further in the future. "We will encounter the realization of hyper-connectivity, AI and robot technologies in the Fourth Industrial Revolution sooner," he said. "A world that we haven't experienced can come quickly, and that poses the biggest challenge to us."