Samsung Germany unveils HDD-to-SSD upgrade and data transfer service

The death of the HDD at the hands of the SSD has been a long time coming. It’s been sung for many years, and now, hot on heels of the Sony PlayStation 5 announcement, it looks like SSDs might finally be getting affordable enough to replace the old HDD solution in most situations, at least when data centers aren’t involved. Samsung is seemingly gearing up for this shift and it has launched a new service in Germany called the Samsung SSD Upgrade Service.

Samsung Germany’s newly-unveiled Solid State Drive Upgrade Partner program allows retail partners in Germany, including MediaMarkt and Saturn, to offer HDD-to-SSD replacement and data transfer services to customers who want to upgrade their computers to the newer storage medium. The costs of upgrading and data transferring at one of these services hasn’t been mentioned, but it sounds like customers can supply their own SSDs as long as they’re Samsung-branded.

Samsung Electronics’ Head of Product Marketing Storage, Susanne Hoffmann, reminds customer in Germany that they don’t have to spend a fortune to upgrade from an HDD to an SSD. The Samsung 860 QVO is a relatively-affordable SSD, costing 109.90 euros for 1TB of storage. Samsung is also developing new PICe Gen-4 SSDs with up to 8TB of storage, and it may even release an 8TB 970 QVO SSD as early as next month, therefore driving the costs of the lower-capacity SSD solutions down even further.

Are you ready to abandon HDDs on your personal computer, or have you already made the switch to SSDs? Would you like to use Samsung’s SSD Upgrade Service to get the newer storage medium and transfer your data hassle-free? Check out Samsung Germany’s dedicated page and search for a partner near you. We’ll keep you posted if Samsung decides to introduce the SSD Upgrade Service to other markets outside of Germany.

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Ex-Samsung exec cites ‘friendship’ for joining Chinese rival – then quits

In a textbook example of bad timing, former Samsung China CEO decided to join one of his ex-employer’s top Chinese rivals just as those very same competitors were facing increased scrutiny over trade secret theft allegations. A company veteran of 30 years, Jang Won-ki helmed Samsung’s operations in China from 2011 to 2017, following a two-year stint at the helm of its LCD business. Last week, he joined Beijing Eswin Computing Technology, one of Samsung Display’s top competitors in the panel manufacturing space.

In a subsequent newspaper interview, Jang said he was merely brought on to advise and wouldn’t be leading Eswin’s R&D efforts, thus concluding Samsung’s trade secrets were perfectly safe with him. A semiconductor engineer by trade, the 66-year-old further added he primarily joined Eswin due to his friendship with founder Wang Dongsheng, who is also the founder of BOE Technology Group.

Public outcry forces his resignation

None of that stopped the public outrcry over the move in South Korea, which ultimately prompted Jang to quit, local media reported earlier reported. Sources close to the former Samsung exec claim he categorized the controversy as a large misunderstanding and hopes his resignation will help smooth things over. He was originally given the position of Eswin Vice Chairman and is the shortest-tenured executive in the company’s history following this episode.

South Korea’s crackdown on Chinese trade secret theft has been intensifying in recent years, especially as many consumer electronics segments are now suffering from extreme saturation. Even Samsung’s relations with traditionally much friendlier American companies are currently… complicated, to put it mildly. Ultimately, expect more drama over executive poaching and corporate espionage allegations to emerge from the Far East in the near future.

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Samsung accused of favoring online sales over offline retailers in India

India is one of the few markets where the offline retail channel still reigns supreme, even as a large part of the population has embraced e-commerce. It’s also a highly competitive smartphone market and brands that compete there have to strike a balance between their online and offline sales strategies.

However, retailers in India have started to feel that Samsung is now favoring online sales over those from its brick-and-mortar partners. They say that Samsung isn’t maintaining price parity of select devices, particularly the M series, to increase online sales as that wouldn’t require Samsung to give margins to offline retailers.

Retailers in India are not happy with Samsung

Mobile retailers in India accuse Samsung of selling its mid-range devices for cheaper online so that customers prefer buying from online channels. It provides a margin to offline retailers and that obviously eats into the company’s profitability. Cutting costs here would enable Samsung to increase profitability.

Samsung isn’t the only one that’s doing this in India. The retailers say that they didn’t receive new stocks from smartphone manufacturers for up to 25 days after the online launch this past month, and when they did get the stock, it just wasn’t enough to meet demand. This meant that customers were essentially forced to purchase the phones online.

The All India Mobile Retailer Association has also raised the issue of price disparity between online and offline channels with Samsung. “We have already written to you regarding the preference of stocks in offline trade, especially during times of COVID-19 when retailers have suffered immense losses due to the lockdown. Samsung must rethink and maintain the same price for both channels,” the association wrote in a letter to the company.

Samsung has ramped up its online sales efforts in India over the past few months, particularly after the COVID19 lockdown. For example, it now offers finance options at customers’ doorstep. It has also been helping out its offline retailers during these difficult times.

Samsung India brought 20,000 retailers online so that they could sell devices to customers in their locality. The company later expanded this program to cover consumer electronics retailers as well.

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Samsung has apparently decided to kill the Galaxy M41

It was first reported a couple of months ago that Samsung had the Galaxy M41 in development. This handset would have been the sequel to the Galaxy M40 that was released last year. However, an interesting rumor has floated about the upcoming device.

The OLED panels in Samsung’s smartphones are supplied by Samsung Display. It was said that the Galaxy M41 would be the first Samsung smartphone with an OLED panel sourced from a third-party. TCL’s China Star Optoelectronics Technology was believed to be supplying panels for this device. Samsung has now reportedly given up on the idea and has thus decided to discontinue the development of the Galaxy M41.

Galaxy M41 discontinued in favor of the Galaxy M51

According to a report out of South Korea, Samsung has stopped work on the Galaxy M41 which was slated to use an OLED display panel from China Star Optoelectronics Technology. The report goes on to mention that the company has decided to release the Galaxy M51 instead.

We exclusively reported last month that the Galaxy M51 is now in development. Details about its specs are limited right now but we suspect that it’s going basically going to be a rebranded Galaxy A51 with a few design and hardware changes. This device will follow the same strategy as the Galaxy M30s which shared many of its internals with the Galaxy A50s.

Samsung considered Chinese panels for the Galaxy M51 as well but they were unable to meet the quality requirements which is why the panels will be sourced from Samsung Display. Recent reports have suggested that Samsung is looking to source Chinese panels for its smartphones as it wants to reduce costs.

This was said to be a possibility for the Galaxy S21 as well but Samsung is already believed to have given up on that idea as BOE’s panels weren’t as good as the ones from Samsung Display.

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Samsung launches new smart TVs, including The Frame 2020, in India

Samsung has announced that it is launching its new smart TVs, including the 2020 version of The Frame TV, in India. The new smart TV lineup will be available in the country through Amazon.in, Flipkart, and Samsung’s online store, starting the midnight of June 19. Samsung had launched The Frame TV and the rest of its smart TV 2020 lineup in other markets, including Australia, Europe, South Korea, and the US a few weeks ago.

The Frame 2020 will be available exclusively through Flipkart, while the rest of the company’s smart TV lineup will also be available for purchase through Amazon. Consumers who buy The Frame TV from Flipkart during the first 48 hours of the first start would be eligible for an instant discount of up to INR 1,500 if the transactions are prepaid. Amazon consumers would get an instant cashback of up to INR 1,000 when purchases are made using SBI credit cards. Samsung is also offering no-cost EMIs on all its new smart TVs through Amazon, Flipkart, and Samsung’s website.

The company’s latest edition of The Frame TV is priced at INR 74,990, INR 84,990, and INR 139,990 for 50-inch, 55-inch, and 65-inch versions, respectively. The TV comes with a 10-year warranty against screen burn-in, a one-year comprehensive warranty, and a two-year screen panel warranty.

The HD-ready and Full HD TV models are available in 32-inch and 43-inch sizes, while 4K TVs are available in 43-inch, 50-inch, 55-inch, and 65-inch versions. The HD ready and Full HD models start from INR 14,490 for the 32-inch version and go up to INR 31,990 for the 43-inch version. Samsung’s new 4K TVs start from INR 36,990 for the 43-inch size and go as high as INR 89,990 for the 65-inch version.

Samsung’s new smart TVs are designed with young millennials in mind and for those who stream a lot of content online. Most of the TVs in the new lineup include all the popular music and video streaming apps and features such as Auto Hotspot, Content Guide, Game Enhancer, Home Cloud, Music Player, Personal Computer Mode, and USB 3.0 port. They also come with AI-powered digital voice assistants Alexa, Bixby, and Google Assistant.

The South Korean firm’s new smart TVs come with a free subscription to Office 365 and 5GB of free cloud storage space. They also have popular video streaming apps, including Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ Hotstar, Jio Cinema, Netflix, Sony LIV, Voot, Voot Kids, YouTube, YouTube Kids, and ZEE5. Those who purchase these TVs would also get up to 50% discount on Eros Now and ZEE5, a one-year free subscription to Gaana+, three months of subscription to Apple Music. The Frame 2020 TV also comes with a three-month subscription (worth INR 897) of Samsung Art Store for free.

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Exclusive: Come check out the Galaxy Watch 3’s specifications

The Galaxy Watch 3 is coming soon. We recently revealed that Samsung will be launching its new smartwatch and wireless earbuds in July, ahead of the August 5 Unpacked launch of the Galaxy Note 20 and Galaxy Fold 2. Now, we have gotten hold of the spec sheet for Samsung’s upcoming smartwatch.

Galaxy Watch 3 specs include 1.2-inch and 1.4-inch displays

A lot is already known about the Galaxy Watch 3, plenty of which was revealed exclusively by us here at SamMobile. The watch is going to come in 41mm and 45mm sizes, have both stainless steel and titanium variants, sport 8GB of internal storage, support LTE and GPS connectivity, and have the usual IP68 water (up to 50 metres in depth for 10 minutes) resistance and MIL-STD-810G design. The physical rotating bezel is making a return, following its absence on the Galaxy Watch Active and Galaxy Watch Active 2 last year.

We can now reveal some of the other specs as well, including the screen sizes and dimensions. The 41mm Galaxy Watch 3 will have a 1.2-inch display and the 45mm version will sport a 1.4-inch display; the two variants will measure 45 x 46.2 x 11.1 mm and 41 x 42.5 x 11.3 mm respectively. The displays are 0.1 inches bigger than the screens on the Galaxy Watch despite smaller overall dimensions of the Watch 3, so we can only surmise that the rotating bezel will not be as thick as before. The displays will be covered by Corning’s Gorilla Glass DX, as revealed by the FCC.

ECG, blood pressure monitoring is on-board

Of course, no smartwatch is complete without health sensors. The Galaxy Watch 3 is going to be pretty much the same as the Galaxy Watch Active 2 in this department: It has a heart rate monitor with 8 pulse-reading photodiodes and support for blood pressure monitoring, and an electrocardiogram (ECG) sensor. Only time will tell whether or not ECG functionality will be available globally at launch. Samsung recently got approval for enabling the Galaxy Watch Active 2’s ECG feature in Korea, and we can only hope the company will get the necessary approvals in other countries by the time the Galaxy Watch 3 hits retail shelves.

Battery capacities on the Galaxy Watch 3 are going to be smaller than those on the Galaxy Watch: The 41mm and 45mm variants have a 340 mAh and 247 mAh battery respectively. These are exactly the same as the batteries inside the Galaxy Watch Active 2 so battery life shouldn’t be an issue, at least on the larger model. We’re also told the new smartwatch will have 1GB of RAM on both variants and run Tizen OS 5.5 out of the box. While there’s no word on what new software features will be present on the Galaxy Watch 3, we can expect them to make their way to existing Galaxy smartwatches with software updates.

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Samsung’s Lee Jae-Yong holds meetings with key executives after dodging arrest

In the ongoing probe against Lee Jae-Yong, Samsung Group’s Vice President, the South Korean court had rejected an arrest warrant last week. Since then, the company’s heir has reportedly held important meetings with key executives from Samsung’s smartphone and semiconductor business arms.

According to reports coming out of South Korea, Lee Jae-Yong met with Kim Ki-Nam and HK Park, who are the CEO and the CFO of Samsung Device Solutions (SDS), respectively. He also met with Jin Gyo-Young, President of Samsung’s memory business, ES Jung, President of Samsung Foundry, and In-Yup Kang, President of Samsung System LSI. Samsung’s heir discussed the investment strategy going forward and the current state of the global semiconductor industry.

Lee also reportedly discussed the roadmap for the company’s 5nm semiconductor process and the upcoming GAA (Gate All Around) technology that is being worked upon by the foundry business. Lee seems to have also discussed the impact of the ongoing China-US trade war on its businesses. It was recently reported that Samsung will supply low-end and mid-range 5G modems for Huawei phones but has taken a decision against making smartphone chips for the Chinese brand.

Samsung’s VP also discussed earnings from the smartphone business for the first half of 2020. He met with Samsung Mobile’s Roh Tae-moon (President), Yunho Choi (CFO), Choi Kyung-Sik (Senior VP of marketing), Kyung-jun Kim (Head of Development), and Kim Sung-Jin (Director of Support Team). This is the first time that Lee has finished all the key meetings within a day.

During his visit to the company’s Xi’an memory plant in China, he had mentioned that the company has no time and that the firm must be prepared for big changes for future growth. It is being reported that there’s a chance of Lee Jae-Yong getting arrested in the controversial merger of Cheil Industries and Samsung C&T. However, Samsung Group has denied all corruption charges against Lee.

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