Unveils 4th-generation Foldable Phones in New York
Samsung Electronics plans to raise the share of foldable phones to half of its flagship smartphone sales by 2025, the company's top executive said in New York on Aug. 10 (local time).
"We will make every effort to make the year of 2022 the first year when we sellg more than 10 million foldable phones," said Roh Tae-moon, head of Samsung Electronics' mobile experience (MX) business division, at a news conference.
"We have a plan to boost the share of foldable products to 50 percent of our Galaxy flagship product sales by 2025,” Roh said after unveiling next-generation foldable phones at Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2022, which was held both online and offline.
Samsung Electronics held an offline event for the first time in two years and six months since February 2020. It introduced new models such as the Galaxy Z Flip 4, the Galaxy Z Fold 4, the Galaxy Watch 5, the Galaxy Buds 2 Pro to the world.
Samsung practically froze prices of its new foldable phones, even in the face of increases in raw material prices. Instead of passing on the cost increase to consumers, it aims to secure profitability by increasing sales volume. At the same time, it intends to boost foldable phones’ popularity by freezing their prices. In Korea, the price of the Galaxy Z Fold 4 256GB is set at 1,998,700 won, the same as its predecessor, despite a rise in the won/dollar exchange rate.
Samsung Electronics also aims to increase its share of the U.S. premium smartphone market with its fourth-generation foldable phones. The Galaxy Z Fold 3 and the Z Flip 3 fell short of the company's expectations in the U.S. market due to supply problems and U.S. consumers' slow adoption of new technologies. However, the new Samsung foldable phones feature much higher product quality realized through trials and errors, so the company expects them to attract greater interest from U.S. consumers.