SamMobile Daily Recap: February 14, 2017 — Gear S3 heading to Verizon, Nougat for the Galaxy S6 and more!

We publish a lot of stories on a daily basis. Unfortunately, the majority of news breaks during our European hours of operation, which makes it difficult for our readers in the US (and other regions) to follow every post that goes live. But, we think we’ve come up with a great solution — a daily recap.

In the list below, you’ll find the stories we’ve published today. Chances are, you’re not going to be interested in all of them. To help you find what’s important to you, we’ve split them into their respective categories — so if you want to see the latest Nougat chatter, locate the Firmware News subheading.

Business

Arrest warrant sought once again for Samsung heir apparent Lee Jae-yong

Samsung heir questioned for 15 hours, prosecutors to decide on arrest by tomorrow

Samsung launches new Design Center focused on consumers in Latin America

Deals

Daily Deal: Bag yourself a Gear Fit 2 for 28% off

Firmware News

Galaxy S7 and S7 edge Nougat firmware for Turkey now available for download

Nougat to arrive on the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy Note 5 in Turkey by the end of February

Laptops

Samsung Chromebook Plus customers get $20 Google Play credit free

Phones

Samsung launches Black Pearl variant of the Galaxy S7 edge in New Zealand

Tablets

Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 running Android 7.0 Nougat surfaces on Geekbench

Galaxy Tab S3 with S Pen leaks in new photo

Watches

Gear S3 frontier for Verizon stops by the FCC

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Daily Deal: Bag yourself a Gear Fit 2 for 28% off

If you’re an aspiring or seasoned health fanatic, you’ll be pleased to hear that you can now pick up Samsung’s second-generation Gear Fit from Amazon in either small, medium/large or large for just $129 (28% off).

For those unaware, the Gear Fit 2 is a state-of-the-art fitness tracker that not only records your runs, sleep and calorie intake, but also mirrors notifications from your smartphone to your wrist.

Like the sound of the Gear Fit 2 and want to take advantage of this deal? Cool! Me too. To head over to the purchase page, simply decide what size is best for you, then hit its respective Buy Now button below.

Buy Now – Small Buy Now – Medium/Large Buy Now – Large

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Nougat to arrive on the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy Note 5 in Turkey by the end of February

Last week, Samsung’s Turkish Vice President Tansu Yegen took to his Twitter profile to share a roadmap detailing the arrival of the long-awaited Android 7.0 Nougat update in Turkey. The documentation reveals that the Galaxy S6, Galaxy S6 edge+ and Galaxy Note 5 will receive the upgrade during the third week of February, while it’s expected to arrive on the Galaxy S6 edge at the end of the month.

Providing things go according to plan, it should then start making its way to the rest of the compatible Galaxy S series handsets in May and finally the Galaxy J range in July. Seeing as the paperwork lists the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge as being graced with the latest flavor of Android during the second week of the month, and the upgrade started rolling out earlier today, we have no reason to doubt the accuracy of the roadmap.

More on Android 7.0: Galaxy S6 Nougat update manual reveals key details

Unfortunately, these specific timeframes are only good for Turkey. There’s no telling how much longer it’ll take for subsidiaries in other countries to start distributing the upgrade. However, Samsung usually likes to keep them all somewhat in sync for the larger regions, so we’re pretty confident in saying that we expect to see the OTA arrive on the Galaxy S6 trio in Europe over the course of the next few weeks.

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Arrest warrant sought once again for Samsung heir apparent Lee Jae-yong

Samsung Electronics vice chairman Lee Jae-yong is not out of the woods just yet. Even though the Seoul Central District Court refused the special prosecutor’s request for an arrest warrant just last month, the Samsung leader was summoned to the prosecutor’s office yesterday and questioned for more than 15 hours. A spokesman for the office confirmed that a decision will soon be made about whether or not an arrest warrant would be sought again. The investigation team has now reached its decision. It has confirmed that an arrest warrant is once again being sought for the Samsung heir apparent Lee Jae-yong.

The arrest of Samsung’s de facto leader is being sought on charges of bribery in relation to South Korea President Park Geun-hye after the first attempt was shot down by the court last month. The court did not see the necessity of the arrest given that the Samsung leader is already barred from leaving the country until the investigation is concluded. Lee Jae-yong has been accused of giving or promising more than $35 million in bribes to Choi Soon-sil, a friend of the president, in return for the government’s backing of a merger between two Samsung affiliates in 2015.

It will be up on the court once again to decide whether not the arrest warrant will be issued. If he’s arrested, Samsung could be looking at a serious leadership vacuum.

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Samsung Chromebook Plus customers get $20 Google Play credit free

Samsung announced the Chromebook Plus at the Consumer Electronics Show 2017 last month and started selling it just yesterday. Powered by Google’s Chrome OS, this Chromebook comes with the Google Play Store installed straight out of the box, meaning that customers will be able to run Android apps on the device right away. Wouldn’t it be nice to get some free credit to blow away on apps for your shiny new Chromebook?

Google already provides a great incentive to new Chromebook customers. They get 100GB of free cloud storage when setting up a new Chromebook, it is limited one time per Google account so it’s not like you can set up multiple Chromebooks with one Google account and get several hundred GBs of cloud storage for free. Google is now offering $20 in Play Store credit for free to those who purchase the Samsung Chromebook Plus.

Multiple users have reported that they see a pop up when booting the Samsung Chromebook Plus for the first time, they just have to click on the “Redeem” button to have $20 added to their Play Store account instantly. Those who didn’t see the pop up can also take advantage of this offer by heading to Google’s “goodies” page from the Chromebook Plus. This offer is valid until July 1, 2017.

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Gear S3 frontier for Verizon stops by the FCC

The Gear S3 frontier is already available from T-Mobile and AT&T in the United States as both of them are GSM carriers. It’s not available via the country’s largest mobile carrier because Samsung is yet to release the CDMA variant. Verizon, as many of you would be well aware, is a CDMA carrier. It appears that Big Red may get the Gear S3 frontier soon as a variant intended for it has stopped by the FCC.

Samsung did launch a CDMA version of the Gear S2 (SM-R730V) on Verizon so it won’t be surprising at all if it does the same for the current-generation smartwatch. We’ve spotted an FCC filing for a Gear S3 frontier bearing model number SM-R765V which more or less confirms that the CDMA variant of this smartwatch is in the pipeline for Verizon.

It’s unclear at this point in time just how long it’s going to take for this Gear S3 frontier variant to be officially announced. Samsung and Verizon haven’t said anything about it as yet but FCC filings are normally considered to be an indication that a formal launch isn’t that far off.

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Samsung heir questioned for 15 hours, prosecutors to decide on arrest by tomorrow

South Korea’s special prosecutor’s office confirmed on Sunday that it would once again summon Samsung Electronics vice chairman Lee Jae-yong for questioning as part of an ongoing investigation into the influence-peddling scandal. Even though a court has previously shot down the prosecutor’s request for an arrest warrant, a second request was not ruled out. Lee Jae-yong was questioned for more than 15 hours after being summoned by the special prosecution yesterday and the prosecutor’s office will decide by tomorrow whether it’s going to seek his arrest once again.

“There will be a decision on whether to make another arrest warrant request for him between today and tomorrow,” special prosecutor’s office spokesman Lee Kyu-chul confirmed to reporters earlier today in a press briefing. The office is also going to decide at the same time whether it’s going to seek arrest warrants for four other Samsung Group executives.

Samsung heir apparent Lee Jae-yong is accused of pledging payments to organizations backed by President Park Geun-hye’s friend Choi Soon-sil to win the government’s support for a controversial merger between two Samsung affiliates back in 2015. The Samsung leader has previously denied allegations of corruption.

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