Samsung is reportedly undergoing management review of its various business units. The review was said to end in July but has been extended to August over some concerns.
Periodic reviews are performed every four to five years and are sometimes launched without warning when the higher-ups see a cause for concern within a particular business unit, in this case, Samsung’s smartphone division.
Due to lackluster sales and recent supply chain issues, Samsung had to call for a “special review” to highlight some of the problems they are facing. The former being caused by declining Galaxy S-series sales.
Samsung has only sold 13.5 million Galaxy S21 series units during H1 of this year despite launching the series earlier than usual. Compared to the S20 that sold mid-20 million units, sources say Samsung is “highly likely” to miss its sales target for the S21.
That, and the poor sales performance in 5G smartphones was also a reason for the review. Samsung was one of the first companies to launch 5G smartphones but has fallen behind in recent years as rivals caught up to the trend.
According to Strategy Analytics, Samsung ranks fourth in the global 5G smartphone market share with 12.5%. Apple dominates with 29.8% followed by OPPO and Vivo with 15.8% and 14.3% respectively.
MediaTek has also been having supply chain difficulties with Samsung. The chipmaker told Samsung that it would not be able to meet all the chip orders due to not only the global chip shortage but also the phone maker’s weakened position in the smartphone market.
This is after a recent Counterpoint research analysis, that reported Xiaomi managed a 17.1% hold of the smartphone sales in June outpacing both Samsung’s 15.7% share and Apple’s 14.3% share.
Samsung will be launching new premium foldables next week, but this segment may not be enough to boost Samsung back to the top global seller. However, it may just lead in the foldables market share.
Next; It’s official; Google’s Pixel 6 will now debut with its custom-built chip dubbed Tensor
Alfred Gitonga is a passionate tech news writer with a deep interest in smartphones and related technologies. He is a staff writer at Mobitrends.co.ke.
