The Scariest Company in Tech

http://rvqs.wordpress.com/2011/02/12/the-scariest-company-in-tech/

by dequantified • 15 years ago

103 53 15 years ago

rvqs.wordpress.com

neworbit• 15 years ago

I would find this more plausible if my Samsung Android devices were

a) regularly updated with Android tech as opposed to seemingly lagging the rest of the industry

b) supported worth a hill of beans instead of getting a "uhhhh we don't support that in the US market" when asking about AT&T

c) a good demonstration of Android capabilities in the first place.

Samsung makes decent phones. Nothing spectacular. The GPS in the Galaxy class phones draws endless complaints about bugginess. The builds deployed on AT&T are mediocre. Their Kies desktop software is bloated, slow, and unreliable - it's frequently the case that disconnecting and reconnecting the phone/tablet fails to recognize it (and in turn it doesn't work with a number of US SKUs, thanks to AT&T).

Sorry gang. There's the potential there to be great. But it's quite a leap from there to dominance. Nokia has had plenty of potential and in the past a pretty dominant position too, but I think the shellacking they took the last few days here on HN is entirely deserved and demonstrative of "you have to nail all facets of the user experience."

Kylekramer2• 15 years ago

This position assumes that dominance requires a base of greatness/nailing all the facets of user experience. While I wish it were true, I haven't really seen that play out.

SandB0x• 15 years ago

Just as in Mike Elgan's analysis of Nokia, it doesn't look like Samsung have any idea how to create a sensible range of products. There are 18 touch screen phones available in the UK (out of 75 phones in total):

http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/mobile-devices/mobile-pho...

If I were King of Samsung, this would be cut down to around three models. The model names would be consistent, recognisable, and the names would not be discarded when the phones are updated. This way, when my Samsung Galaxy Pro is due for a replacement, I can go and ask for the latest generation Samsung Galaxy Pro. No need to spend ages trying to figure out which of the vast selection is supposed to be the flagship, or which is the budget model. The laptop situation is even worse. What's scary is how nobody but Apple seem to have figured this out.

Kylekramer2• 15 years ago

When your aim is ubiquity, 18 models of the same basic product is a positive, not a negative. Apple and Samsung are playing entirely different games. Apple is built on brand and large profit margins, Samsung on controlling the components and being everywhere. They are equally valid plans, but Apple's way is more likely to win fans.

SoftwareMaven2• 15 years ago

But Apple is successfully training customers that it is nice to be able to shop a simple product line. People are tired of being confused, and Apple makes it trivial to not be confused.

Samsung's ubiquity game isn't going to work if the customers are sick of playing it.

sambeau• 15 years ago

Of course, they are a big part of successful mobile devices even without the Galaxy.

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/02/14/7_8b_in_parts_...

"The partnership between Apple and Samsung is expected to grow in 2011, as a new report claims Apple will become the company's largest customer with $7.8 billion in component purchases -- even as Samsung attempts to compete with Apple's iPhone and iPad with new products unveiled this week."

patrickgzill• 15 years ago

This is a first post, on a dead-stock Wordpress.com installation.

Why should I bother to read about your views on Samsung when:

1. you show neither data nor other facts on which to base your opinion

2. you don't disclose anything about yourself?

For all I know you could be a Samsung employee trying to increase the value of his stock benefits.

meterplech• 15 years ago

The great thing about the internet is that people can express their point of views. If the idea is a good and interesting one it will be discussed. Think of it as an anonymous letter to the editor if you need.

beoba• 15 years ago

The linkbait title doesn't help their case.

mieses• 15 years ago

You both make good points but this blog post still smells like a cheap marketing stunt.

lss456• 15 years ago

I was fascinated by the out-of-box Wordpress installation. The author didn't even get rid of the "hello world" post or the tagline that says "just another wordpress blog". That's what made this article so eerie - it's a first blog post on 0% customized Wordpress blog.

phamilton• 15 years ago

One interesting competitor to Samsung is Vizio. While they only really have a presence in Home theater equipment, I find them to be very interesting. They are a completely new player. In a lot of ways they are similar to Hyundai. Hyundai essentially had no name brand or history to sell it's products. So they built the best car they could and sold it at a great price. The Hyundai Genesis was born. Now Hyundai is becoming more and more popular and is getting the credit they deserve. Vizio is similar. As a new player, it seems they just decided to make great products at affordable prices. In doing so, they have managed to keep up with huge companies like Sony and Samsung.

I would like to see a company like that enter the mobile market. Someone who makes a product that speaks for itself.

count• 15 years ago

Vizio isn't a Samsung competitor, really. It's basically an American front for AmTran, a Taipei-based contract manufacturer. Neither AmTran, nor Vizio make their own electronics/panels (one integrates, the other brands/markets). I wouldn't bet the house that Samsung didn't actually make the panels that go into Vizio TVs...it's a crazy world over there!

sudonim• 15 years ago

If samsung operates their business units independently, and don't play favorites, then Apple can easily have the purchasing power with Samsung Displays the Samsung Phones has. However, if samsung plays a slightly dirtier game, then they risk losing Apple as a customer and can't sustain a competitive advantage in displays. Nobody buys an Apple phone for the Samsung memory or display. Likewise, no one will stop buying those items if Apple switches to a different vendor.

jdub2• 15 years ago

There is one area in which Samsung is lacking: software. Unlike Apple or RIM, they are entirely dependent on Android. [...] That, however, could change completely if Samsung dominates the Android market like I think it will.

Want to be even more scared?

http://www.rasterman.com/index.php?page=News

:-)

dman• 15 years ago

This cheered me up!

joebananas• 15 years ago

So they will ship in 2025 with the hottest in 2010 design as their look then, if he's the lead?

brianbreslin• 15 years ago

If samsung is building out their own os using it for only mobile phones seems myopic... Think about all the markets they play in

dagw• 15 years ago

Samsung already has a mobile OS, called Bada, that they have been shipping for a while now.

naner• 15 years ago

Meh, hard to get excited over vaporware.

azakai• 15 years ago

I don't get it, I thought Samsung Bada was not a secret project anymore?

http://www.bada.com/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bada_%28operating_system%29

jdub2• 15 years ago

I don't think he's talking about Bada (certainly not current Bada... though what he's doing might relate to future-Bada).

Keyframe• 15 years ago

Unlike Apple or RIM, they are entirely dependent on Android.

My Samsung Omnia 7 disagrees (WP7).

stcredzero• 15 years ago

The majority installed base plus a strong developer following will make Samsung’s fork the de facto choice...I don’t know if Samsung is capable of such a coup (their software up ‘til now has been garbage)

This is precisely the reason no one should be scared. If Samsung attempts this, they would be going up against Google on the field of software.

In contrast, I like Apple's plan better -- win on UX, customer service, marketing, and design. Those are all areas where Google is weak.

ashbrahma• 15 years ago

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/apple-to-buy-78-billion-in-...

From link "Apple Inc. (AAPL 356.85, +2.31, +0.65%) is expected to purchase components used for its handheld devices from Samsung Electronics Co. worth about $7.8 billion this year, the Korea Economic Daily reported Monday, citing industry sources.

The paper also said that Samsung will supply Apple with liquid crystal displays, mobile application processors and NAND flash memory chips used for the U.S. company's iPhones and iPads.

If the contract pushes through, Apple will become Samsung's largest customer, the paper added."

nika3• 15 years ago

Apple also reported in one of their financial calls that they spent $4.9 Billion out of the war chest to secure future supplies of components they consider critical. They didn't say which ones they were... but I think they feel the market is there for any of the others.

erikpukinskis• 15 years ago

The OP's argument rests on the notion that Samsung could somehow make phones so compelling that they take over 80% of the market. I don't think they can do that on price alone. Their price advantage over LG, HTC, etc could be what... 10%? They need more of an advantage than that to have Microsoft-level dominance.

And even though they have the price advantage over the other "premium" vendors, they are fighting a war on two fronts. The ultra cheap vendors can undercut even Samsung by doing things like using super cheap plastic, having batteries that stop working after 6 months, dead pixels, and a software team of like 2 people who just maintain a couple drivers and slap some shitty graphics and free apps on top of stock Android.

So Samsung's playground is a sizeable but bounded slice in the middle: people who don't care about having the BEST phone, and want it to be really cheap, but not cheap cheap. Cheap, but on-brand.

Microsoft had no real competition. No one else was really licensing an OS for commodity hardware. Apple, IBM, Sun et all were all selling their OS on their own hardware.

Samsung is beset on all sides by competition, and they only hold one of the Aces (supply chain).

ippisl• 15 years ago

I don't think this is true when devices are being sold throught carriers. carriers would require decent quality , and 10% price reduction for carriers is a lot of money.

fomojola• 15 years ago

Yeah, Samsung's Android devices may look pretty, but the software builds are not only very slow to be upgraded (mostly 'cause they want you to buy the new hardware, which is kind of stupid on their part) but they actually have very poor performance running apps. I've used multiple members of the Galaxy S family and have a Galaxy Tab for development purposes and to put it mildly they suck from a software perspective. The Tab arbitrarily locks up depending on the software you're running (as in stops responding, requires a hard reset to be usable again), their Bluetooth implementation is terrible and doesn't function right (I guess their choice of Bluetooth hardware didn't work with the default Android drivers so they had to write their own; somehow software that runs perfectly on a Nexus One or Motorola/LG hardware totally keels over on Samsung hardware) and their customized software overlay is amazingly sluggish.

Lets not get into the monstrosities that are their feature phone operating systems. I for one don't believe anyone is in danger from Samsung.

genieyclo• 15 years ago

I think it's interesting the author doesn't mention Bada http://www.bada.com , Samsung's new OS for mobile that's designed to be an "open" competitor to the other mobile OSes out there.

I tried signing up to be a developer about a year ago when they first announced it and I had a under-powered feature phone (Samsung Behold I), yet was discouraged by the fees and other associated things to even sign up...

After reading the Wikipedia page on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bada_%28operating_system%29#Cri... ...I'm glad I saw the light and bought an iPhone.

nika3• 15 years ago

I think it would be wise, as this article does, to not think about the phone market in terms of platforms (iOS, Android, RIM & WebOS) but in terms of manufacturers (Apple, HTC, Nokia, Samsung, etc.)

If you look at it in those terms, there are two manufacturers that are vertically integrated- Apple and Samsung.

Samsung is weak on software, and software is the critical component of this age (more important than flash, RAM or SoCs). Meanwhile, Apple is a design house, and doesn't have manufacturing capability of its own.

So, one question is whether owning your own plants will be critical or not.

Consider this possibility- it is like the Windows market, only instead of it being a licensed OS, it is Apple, and Apple devices, but HTC et. al. become contract manufacturers for Apple. The margins may not be any better than competing in the commodity phone market, but the R&D and marketing costs are a lot less, and so they may be more profitable.

I'm sure this goes against their DNA, but unless FoxConn can expand enough to cover the demand (for Apple and for everybody else) I can see the commoditization happening at the manufacturing level, rather than the device level, as it did in the PC market.

Samsung has had a decade to replicate the iPod, or to build a video game system. I don't know if they will be able to build the expertise or find the mojo that Apple has on software.

I don't think Apple is going to start building plants nor will they build expertise in lithography, etc.

But I think that while software is easy to commoditize (eg: Android) a quality software experience is much harder. Meanwhile, it is cheaper to be a contract manufacturer for a %5 margin than it is to try and compete with your own products.

So, Apple could be the new Microsoft, and Samsung could be the new Apple-- if software is what matters. The reverse could occur if lithography expertise is what ends up mattering.

nl5• 15 years ago

Apple isn't vertically integrated at all. As you note, they don't own any production facilities, and outsource all production. Almost the total opposite of Samsung, who so almost everything themselves.

I guess I'm a bit confused what you think vertically integrated means?

nika3• 15 years ago

Apple designs the software, the hardware industrial design, the circuit boards, the processor and even the screens. Samsung merely manufactures things, and does not design the software (for android phones) or the CPU etc.

But of course what matters on this site is bashing apple and pretending like they suck, even if you have to redefine terms like "Vertically integrated" and be snide about it.

astrange• 15 years ago

I find myself completely unable to tell if the comments on this post are spam or not. Except for that one with the poorly thought out flame about Apple, which seems real enough.

jallmann• 15 years ago

I don't think Samsung cares about software. They are primarily a manufacturing concern, and their lineup of branded phones and devices is just a way to eke out more value from that existing capacity.

Could be that manufacturing capacity is slack, or they need a technology demonstration for design firms that otherwise aren't moving quickly enough ("Hey, we have all this stuff, let's make something cool out of it!").

That'd explain why they were one of the first Android tablets out there, especially with Android not really being tablet-ready. That kind of risk could break a firm that had to outsource manufacturing. But Samsung already had all the hardware pieces; they just had to drop in the software.

nl5• 15 years ago

A vertically integrated manufacturer does not necessarily mean their costs will be dramatically lower than the competition.

For example, Apple doesn't do any manufacture themselves, and yet they have costs so much lower than the competition that they are able to define entire new markets in the time it takes for their competition to develop cost-competitive supplies.

This has happened three times now, firstly with the original iPods (Apple pre-signed huge contracts for those tiny hard drives, proved the market, and when competitors wanted in they had to wait for new sources to come online), the iPod touch (Apple pre-ordered a huge proportion of the worlds flash memory supply) and finally, most recently with the iPad.

Ever wonder why it's taken a year for anyone to build a 9"/10" iPad competitor? It's because no one can get capacitative touch screen in sufficient quantities. Even Samsung (which owns the factory!) had to make do with 7" screens.

Now, finally new factories are beginning to come online, which means that competitors can release their products. The problem for them is that Apple locked in much lower prices (because of their bigger purchasing power), which makes it hard to compete on price. This applies to Samsung as much as to anyone - they can't afford to drop Apple as a customer, but the capital costs of building a new factory means it costs them more to supply themselves (selling in smaller volume) than it does to supply Apple.

berntb• 15 years ago

Interesting, I thought Apple didn't know they would get such a hit with the iPad? They had gotten options on production?

I assumed the problem was developing something that could compete with the software (which might have happened with Android 3?).

Edit: My problem with Samsung is abandonware -- drivers, etc -- but I don't know if they are worse than others.

mgkimsal3• 15 years ago

IIRC, Apple was predicting iPad sales of 10M in 2010, which many analysts scoffed at. Also, IIRC, they sold 7M in just the last quarter of 2010 (admittedly, the holiday season). So yeah, I believe Apple was pretty confident.

nl5• 15 years ago

Android 2.2 is ok for a tablet (as the Samsung Tab shows). It's true it isn't optimized for it, but does a perfectly adequate job.

btipling• 15 years ago

I like the 7" screen, are those going away?

nl5• 15 years ago

No, they are keeping those - just introducing more sizes as well (now that they have the capacity to produce them)

rsingel• 15 years ago

Samsung forks Android. Google refuses to license Google Android software to it. Goodbye Market, Gmail, Nav, etc.

Sorry, just don't see that happening.

Oh, and HTC's phones are so much better quality than the Samsung phones.

TimothyBurgess• 15 years ago

I hope Samsung sticks with hardware... they should stay far, far away from software.

I (sadly) still use a Samsung Instinct and the OS is of their own design. If you've ever used Samsung's Instinct you'd know it's absolutely terrible and slow. I can't remember the last time I typed something - and I don't even type fast - and it wasn't at least a couple of seconds behind my fingers... pretty annoying when the touch screen won't calibrate and you make at least one typo every other word!

The only upside to the phone is the relative ease of "unlocking" it for use as a 4G modem.

Create• 15 years ago

you are talking of the Samsung Linux Platform [this is not Bada nor Android ], to be launched in 2011. It uses 2.6.32-es Linux, X Window System, Enlightenment Foundation Libraries (EFL), GTK keretrendszer, Gstreamer etc.

Applications are C/C++ UI is GTK/EFL. Has multitasking and Debian package management.

http://jeffhoogland.blogspot.com/2011/02/samsung-is-backing-...

http://www.oss.kr/?module=file&act=procFileDownload&...

now let us wonder about the non-goog customers of canonical, with Unity, the need to ditch X11, ditch Gnome3 …fresh release of GTK3.

neutronicus• 15 years ago

A Microsoft-level monopoly is impossible in the phone market. Why? Not enough lock-in. People bought Microsoft because it was cheap, but also because buying a mac would make you that guy, whose powerpoint presentation never worked, whose Word files always looked funky, who always had trouble getting on the intranet. No matter how much embracing and extending a phone OS does, an Android phone can call a WP7 phone can call an iOS phone can call a Symbian phone can call a ...

"You can only call your friends (or 911) if they've got a Samsung"? I don't see that working too well. (Especially because, in the US, a call that sounds bad or doesn't go through on Samsung to X will be blamed on the Network, so the carriers will just leave Samsung (or whomever) out in the cold.)

saturdaysaint• 15 years ago

From the linked post - "What made the PC industry a commodity industry was that none of the big PC manufacturers at any point controlled the important components or shipped those components en masse."

The author never gives proof that Samsung "controls" any of the important components of a smartphone. Don't they merely license their chip designs from ARM, Qualcomm, etc? Is their screen technology based on in-house IP or are they basically commodity manufacturers of new technology? In the absence of these arguments, this article felt like fluff from someone that's seen the word "Samsung" on the BOM for a few phones.

Also, a company's manufacturing and distribution prowess has almost nothing to do with their ability to create a popular consumer software platform. See: Nokia. The only reason Samsung can be mentioned is that they've rapidly adopted Google's operating system. Surmising that they could fork Android is as absurd as imagining that Dell or Asus could alone create a Linux distro that could compete with Windows.

The Scariest Company in Tech

Related Stories