The worldwide recall for the Galaxy Note 7 due to exploding batteries has been a nightmare for Samsung and its customers. However, there seems to be a silver lining hiding behind all the issues, and it involves the company's next flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S8.
Even after the replacement of all the Galaxy Note 7 units with faulty batteries, Samsung will find it difficult to restore the trust of customers in the company and its products. However, as reported by the Korea Herald, analysts think that instead of trying to make up for the damaged Galaxy Note 7 image and the lost sales of the smartphone, Samsung should instead focus on launching the Galaxy S8 earlier than planned.
According to KB Investment & Securities analyst Kim Sang-pyo, an earlier launch for the Galaxy S8 is the most realistic solution for Samsung to be able to deal with the recall crisis of the Galaxy Note 7. This would be regardless of when the sales of Galaxy Note 7 will resume, which is expected to happen in South Korea on Sept. 19 but is unclear in other countries as governments have placed restrictions on the smartphone's sale and usage.
An earlier launch for the Galaxy S8, according to Kim, would also maintain the profitability of Samsung's mobile division as opposed to releasing the smartphone some time at the end of the first quarter of 2017.
In another analyst report, Mirae Asset Securities echoed the findings of Kim and KB Investment & Securities, stating that Samsung would be able to reduce the negative impact on sales of the Galaxy Note 7 recall by releasing the Galaxy S8 earlier compared to using up resources to try to recover the sales of the Galaxy Note 7 that were lost.
Samsung could already be on track of releasing the Galaxy S8 earlier than planned, with rumors surrounding the smartphone already heating up.
The most recent report on the device claims that the codenames for the Galaxy S8 variants are Dream and Dream 2, with the Galaxy S8 Dream sporting model code SM-G950 and the Galaxy S8 Dream 2 named the SM-G955. The Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge were coded as SM-G930 and SM-G935, with Samsung skipping the G940 and G945 names because of the belief in South Korea that the number 4 brings bad luck.
Another recent report confirms that Samsung will be featuring curved screens in all variants of the Galaxy S8, with the company already starting to secure the display panels that will be used by the Galaxy S8 and the Galaxy S8 edge.
