That Samsung has been in a crisis for the last one month is not in doubt. The company has had to halt shipments and sales of its latest flagship device, the Galaxy Note 7, recall over 2.5 million units that had already been shipped (a rather costly affair) and watch helplessly as rival Apple announced and released to the market the device the Note 7 was meant to take on in the market, the iPhone 7.
The Galaxy Note 7’s reported explosions and fires were traced back to faulty batteries according to the company. However, by the time the company suspended battery orders from the concerned supplier, Samsung SDI, and started issuing replacement devices, a lot of damage had already been done. Civil aviation authorities and airlines in various countries had already sounded the alarm and the Note 7 was mostly an unwelcome guest on most flights.
Despite all that, Samsung was expected to at least try and bounce back with the company having supplied most of its partners (carriers) with replacement Galaxy Note 7 units that it had certified as safe. The company was even expected to launch the device in markets where it hadn’t done so before reports of explosions started trickling. South Africa, for instance, was set to get the Note 7 on November 11th.
However, reports of some of the Galaxy Note 7s that Samsung had deemed safe exploding seem to be taking all of that back. Influential partners like American mobile carriers are on high alert and some are allowing Note 7 users (with “safe” devices) to switch to other devices while others have halted sales of the device. Now, reports from Korea indicate that the company may have also halted any further production of the ill-fated Galaxy Note 7.
It is increasingly looking like the Galaxy Note 7 will be the one device that Samsung will want to quickly forget. Whether that will be by way of suspending any further sales for good we don’t know yet but the brand will take a long time to recover from the smoke it leaves in its trail. The sooner it can walk away from it, the better.
Photo of charred Note 7 from Reddit
