Google Play, Verizon launch could boost Samsung Galaxy S4 sales past already high expectations

Zac Hall

Samsung Galaxy S4

Samsung has proven almost effortlessly that the 5-inch smartphone has its place in the hands of the masses as it is on track to selling 10 million handsets in its first month, The Korea Times reports.

The company has plenty of room for sales to exponentially grow upward, possibly past their own already high expectations, as the smartphone that has taken the Android world by storm has yet to actually launch on Verizon in the States.

Verizon seems readily positioned to launch the Galaxy S4 as it announced earlier this week that it plans to sell the Samsung smartphone a week sooner than expected.

Samsung’s co-CEO Shin John-Kyun says the company expects the Galaxy S4 to be the fastest selling smartphone in the company’s history.

“We are confident that we will pass more than 10 million sales of the S4 next week. It is selling much faster than the previous model S3,” Samsung Electronics co-CEO Shin Jong-Kyun told reporters at an industry forum in Seoul, Thursday.

We got our hands on the Galaxy S4 last month for a review and gave it flying colors. Read more

Samsung hints at Galaxy S4 software update to address storage discrepancies

Zac Hall

Samsung has received criticism for the amount of storage its flagship Galaxy S4 smartphone allows users to access out of the box, but CNET reports that Samsung may be considering ways it could optimize the operating system and free up more space for users.

Samsung’s Galaxy S4 smartphone runs a custom variant of Android, which allows the company to include features not on other Android phones including Google’s own Nexus phones, but the feature-heavy OS comes at the cost of using half the capacity on a 16GB device.

We’re quite fond of the software featured on the Galaxy S4 as it allows it to stand out from other comparable smartphones, and the Galaxy S4 allows users to add to its storage with microSD cards which you can buy for less than 10 bucks in many cases, something the Apple iPhone and HTC One compromise on for design.

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Android notebooks from Samsung to launch in 3-4 months as Google preps Apple TV competitor and smart watch?

Jordan Kahn

Chromebook-PixelKGI Securities analyst Mingchi Kuo, who has been known to have accurate information regarding Apple product launches in the past, is out today with a new note that includes some surprisingly specific specs for upcoming products from Google. One of the products Kuo expects to see at Google I/O later this month is a new Nexus 7, but the note also included info on what he thinks Google has in store for the months after the event, including: an Android powered notebook, a new TV product, and even a Google smart watch.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard about an Android-powered notebook over the years, and just last month Intel executives confirmed that the majority of its new sub-$200 notebooks running on its mobile Atom CPU will be Android based. However, according to Mingchi, don’t expect to see the notebooks making an appearance at I/O this year. That’s because Android 5.0 won’t be ready to show off at I/O, says Kuo, but vendors such as Samsung will apparently move first with Android 4.x powered notebooks coming within 3-4 months:

Android Book – Android Book won’t be introduced at the upcoming Google I/O as development of Android 5.0, which is targeted at NB, is incomplete. We think Android Book featuring Android.4x will be rolled out in the coming 3-4 months because some brand vendors, like Samsung (Korea), want to move first. But shipments will be limited as the current Android OS isn’t well supported for laptops.

As for Google’s rumored over-the-top TV content business, Mingchi says an Apple TV-like competitor is on the way but delays due to a change to Nvidia Tegra from TI OMAP means we likely won’t see it at I/O. Kuo also said in his note to clients today that he expects Google to launch a smart watch-like wearable device alongside Google Glass, but it apparently won’t go into mass production until next year: Read more

Android now powers almost 60% of smart mobile devices

Jordan Kahn

Screen Shot 2013-05-09 at 12.33.19 PM

Research firm Canalys is out today with its latest report tracking worldwide smart mobile device shipments for Q1 with Android accounting for almost 60% of smart mobile devices shipped by OS. That’s compared to a 19.3% share for Apple and approximately 18.1% for Microsoft. Keep in mind Canalys’s report also includes notebooks, in addition to tablets and smartphones, which account for the majority of Microsoft’s share. When looking at tablets alone, Apple continued its lead with 46.4% share in the quarter, although Canalys warned Apple “lost share to its Android-based rivals for the third consecutive quarter.”

‘Spearheaded by Google and Amazon, the commoditization of the tablet market has happened far quicker than that of the wider PC market,’ said Canalys Senior Analyst, Tim Coulling. ‘Profit margins are being squeezed and vendors without a low cost structure will find it hard to compete. A solid range of must-have accessories and a software and services strategy are vital as vendors will increasingly need to make revenue around their devices.’

When it comes to smartphones, the report has Android at roughly 75.6% of shipments with around 32% of those shipments coming from Samsung. We know Apple sold around 37 million iPhones in the quarter but, as always, we warn that the stats from Canalys don’t include shipped vs sold data.  Read more

Report says Samsung planning 4.3-inch Galaxy S4 Zoom with 16 megapixel camera

Jordan Kahn

Samsung Galaxy Phone

Samsung must have received a good response with its Galaxy Camera that we first got a look at last year during IFA in Berlin, as new reports suggest the company is getting ready to introduce a new camera/smartphone hybrid dubbed the “Galaxy S4 Zoom”. The report comes from the often reliable SamMobile, and suggests that Samsung is preparing to introduce the device as its first “camera phone” with a 16 megapixel camera similar to that included in the Galaxy Camera:

SamMobile says the Galaxy S4 Zoom will include a slightly smaller 4.3” qHD SAMOLED display, 8GB of onboard storage, Bluetooth 4.0 LE, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, A-GPS, and the latest version of Jelly Bean alongside Samsung’s Touch Wiz UI. The report also claims the device will run dual or quad-core processor but CPU and RAM specs aren’t yet finalized.

According to the report Samsung is hoping to launch its new Galaxy S4 Zoom camera smartphone sometime in June and July in both while and black variants.