The Galaxy Note 7, one of its most high-profile
phones, which blew up in its face,
suffering multiple recalls and bans by airlines before only now flickering
out
with a final "death update" that essentially bricks the
remaining units in the wild. Then there was the recall of a defective washing
machine, throwing into question the safety of its entire product lineup.
It's a startling spiral down for a
company that was riding so high after the critically lauded Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge. The Note 7, which won its own positive
reviews, was supposed to capitalize on the momentum and put Apple back on its
heels.
For
Samsung, 2017 can't come soon enough. But the very first week of the new year
brings CES, which marks the first public event for the Korean electronics titan
since the Note 7 debacle. Under the bright lights of the massive gadgets
exposition, it typically focuses on TVs, home appliances and other big
electronics, but its phone failure is sure to be the elephant in the room
"Even if they don't say
anything, on any flight that most people would be taking into Las Vegas, they
would be reminded about this issue with the hardware," said Reticle
Research analyst Ross Rubin. "It will be fresh in people's minds.
Samsung's main task in 2017 is to
convince consumers to trust it again. If one of its most important devices
could have fatal problems, what does that say about everything else it makes?
First on Samsung's agenda is
figuring out what happened -- and communicating that openly to consumers. It
originally tied the Note 7's overheating to a battery flaw, but the second
recall showed it was something more.
Samsung has said it's working with a
third-party investigator to figure out what caused the phones' thermal
problems. As of now, it still doesn't know.
You know what would be a great place
to clear the air? CES, the world's largest consumer electronics show.
"Samsung has to reassure
customers that it knows what happened ... and that it's taking steps to address
it," Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart said. "So far, we haven't
gotten that message from them."
The company, of course, may choose
to ignore the issue entirely and focus on its new products. But that would be a
mistake -- especially if it hasn't said something in the days before the show
about what caused the Note problems.
Samsung said in a statement:
"We are working to identify and address what went wrong
as quickly as possible, and as part of the investigation we're re-visiting
every step of our engineering, manufacturing and quality control processes, in
partnership with independent third-party experts. This investigation has been
thorough, and will take time. We take very seriously our responsibility to
understand the core issue and once the analysis is complete, to communicate our
findings transparently, definitively and quickly."
Given how
competitive the high-end smartphone market is, Samsung will need to steal
customers away from other handset vendors. But the data suggests it may
struggle with that.
The company said in a statement that
"through this difficult process we have been, and will continue to listen
to our customers, learn, and work to renew trust and confidence in our brand
and our products.
This is our top priority." For Samsung to really turn things
around, it needs to wow people with its next flagship phone
and to step up its game with upcoming devices in general. Many reviewers
believed it had found the winning combination in the Note 7 -- sleek design,
water resistance and new features like an iris scanner. Now Samsung needs to
build on that with the Galaxy S8, but without the
exploding bit.
And Samsung needs to make its
devices work together better, something that seems to be an eternal problem for
the company. It owns all of the pieces of electronics puzzle: TVs, home
appliances, mobile devices. Now it needs to put them together.
The first evidence of that could
come in early January at CES.
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