Perhaps Samsung smart phone buyers are finally realizing their android phone is a Google spy in their hands seeing and hearing everything they do. Your can only fool people for a time, then they wise up to the game.
It probably has a lot do to with the fact that the S5 is coming out soon -- Apple sales often peaks in 4Q (or 1Q for Apple); then steadily declines until the next iPhone release. Samsung's profit is likely to surpass Apple's in 2Q and 3Q this year.
I think it's pointless to sponsor every single major world sports events (eg, the summer / winter Olympics), or buy celebrity endorsement -- though not all of them are bad (eg, Jay-Z bad, LeBron James cool). Now, I don't think all of Samsung's 2013 marketing budget $13B went into advertising and celebrity endorsements, I heard a large chunk of their marketing expenses pay for rebates, etc, etc.. Anybody know the exact break down?
So, I'm guessing that either the bulk of the $13B was wasted, or the soon to be much more frugal Samsung is going to see a dip in sales and marketshare. Either way, I don't think that the S5 is going to save them, whenever it arrives. Chalk that up to low and mid range competition that will reduce ASP.
Samsung has peaked marketshare. Profits will soon follow. Such is the way of capitalism.
This can't be blamed on competition because revenue is actually up slightly from Q3 2013 and up significantly from Q4 2012. Revenues are perfectly correlated with sales, so sales couldn't have declined unless per-device margins increased.
This drop in profits is due to increased expenses.
Did you even read the report? Sales were up only 0.3% from Q3. And this is a holiday quarter, the best time of year for a consumer electronics company.
Reading further, consumer electronics was up 18%, but mobile was down 9%.
Seems pretty clear. Samsung sold more electronics goods, but less mobile. And considering Samsung claims a significant increase in tablet sales it can only mean phone sales dropped even more than 9%.
Did you even read the report? Sales were up only 0.3% from Q3. And this is a holiday quarter, the best time of year for a consumer electronics company.
Reading further, consumer electronics was up 18%, but mobile was down 9%.
Seems pretty clear. Samsung sold more electronics goods, but less mobile. And considering Samsung claims a significant increase in tablet sales it can only mean phone sales dropped even more than 9%.
So, just to be clear, you don't disagree with me? Samsung's earnings didn't decrease because of a decrease in sales? Good, I'm glad we're on the same page.
It probably has a lot do to with the fact that the S5 is coming out soon -- Apple sales often peaks in 4Q (or 1Q for Apple); then steadily declines until the next iPhone release. Samsung's profit is likely to surpass Apple's in 2Q and 3Q this year.
I think it's pointless to sponsor every single major world sports events (eg, the summer / winter Olympics), or buy celebrity endorsement -- though not all of them are bad (eg, Jay-Z bad, LeBron James cool). <span style="font-size:13px;line-height:1.4em;">Now, I don't think all of</span>
[SIZE=13px]Samsung's[/SIZE]<span style="font-size:13px;line-height:1.4em;"> 2013 marketing budget $13B went into advertising and celebrity endorsements, I heard a large chunk of their marketing expenses pay for rebates, etc, etc.. Anybody know the exact break down?</span>
Sooo... it has a lot to do with the S5 coming out? I'd say it had a lot to do with Samsung being unable to peak during the huge Holiday buying frenzy.
Of course there's no breakdown of their advertizing budget, that's where they hide all the bribes and payouts to shills haunting the Apple-cetric blogs. Samsung may be unethical, corrupt and operated by a criminal, but it ain't stupid.
I'm systems architect for 15+ years, serial tech entrepreneur (three successful businesses) and have successful apps on the app store. After years of fiddling with Windows admin and development, I saw the light... Apple makes damn good products on rock solid platforms. Unix + Objective-C. It's so elegant and efficient.
So stop you're stupid stereotyping.
But then again, you are probably paid to troubleshoot and install anti-virus software on Windows machines all day so switching to Mac would threaten your job security. So quaint.
Were you mumbling to yourself or was these comments directed toward someone??
So, just to be clear, you don't disagree with me? Samsung's earnings didn't decrease because of a decrease in sales? Good, I'm glad we're on the same page.
He's saying Samsung's mobile phone sales *decreased*, but overall revenue was propped up by other electronics sales.
Increase in marketing expense and holiday shopping should have boosted their mobile phone sales too. Apparently, they didn't help much against low cost alternatives and Apple's new phones.
This article is a total farce and sad conclusion to reality. Samsung is the leading android manufacturer with the highest market on the android platform over three years now.
Nobody who really knows about technology buys iphones only clueless joe's uneducated simpletons in technology buy iphones.
Being king of the turds, still makes somebody a turd. Android is garbage and being the number one garbage maker means nothing.
As for your second statement, which is both incorrect and extremely ignorant, not to mention a tad uneducated, is simply not true. Android is what attracts the simpletons, the clueless, the desperate and the poor who can not afford to purchase anything else. Android is a terrible performing platform, plagued by fragmentation, lag, sloppy performance, sub par apps, malware and viruses. It's a total joke of an OS, used by people who are mostly amateurs and people who can't afford anything else. Android is used by many people as a phone that's only one step above a dumb phone, if even that.
iOS leads in all important categories, in virtually all professional fields. iPhones and iPads are being adopted by a whole multitude of various entities, ranging from government, to science, to healthcare, to retail, to arts, you name it. In each of these places you'll find iOS devices being widely adopted and used. Some people and businesses are even ditching their PC's for iOS devices. Android devices simply do not cut it, when performing most tasks. All sorts of add on accessories, both professional and consumer are made for iOS devices, Android has almost nothing.
Only the most ignorant of the ignorant chooses Android. I would never even hire anybody who showed up with an Android device, as that would tell me all I needed to know about that person.
AI's spin on this story differs significantly from the rest of the tech press. It's worth hearing this story from all sides.
According to Samsung...
"marketing costs and "year-end inventory adjustments" _lowered shipments_ and cut into profits."
?This implies that they had overshipped previously. And before the shopping season, retailers want stagnant products out of their shelves to replace with newer SKUs. This stock rebalancing act means the resellers effectively bought fewer new Samsung phones (The rest were treated as replacements for unsold SKUs).
It is easy to claim demand has increased. Next quarter, Samsung will try to overship again to make up for the "loss in momentum". This is a common phenomenon for companies who stuff the channel aggressively. A few quarters down, they will report another setback again as the channel readjust its inventory another time. This was the game the old Sony played. Kaz Hirai finally got rid of the practice because the channel stuffing game almost brought the electronics division to its knees -- if the prices erode quickly, and currency rate fluctuate. Same things that are happening to Samsung the last quarter and now.
You can already tell the impact of the negative effect since a holiday quarter usually sell 2-3 times a regular quarter. Yet Samsung's profitability dipped instead of increased. That means they had a lot of unsold inventory. When they release S5, these unsold S4, Note, etc. will need to be marked down too. That's why in the last quarter, you see a few Samsung executives fined for trying to prop up their online phone price. They were basically fighting their own system because these poor managers have revenue targets to meet.
As for marketing cost, they will continue to fund the channels, but perhaps more selectively.
EDIT: Forgot to mention that in India, because Apple phased out iPhone 4 last quarter, Samsung were able to capture more marketshare at the low end. This has helped them slightly. But not enough to stop the drop in profit because the margin for these low end phones are too low.
Perhaps Samsung smart phone buyers are finally realizing their android phone is a Google spy in their hands seeing and hearing everything they do.
Your can only fool people for a time,
then they wise up to the game.
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
You "only" need to control the shipper and jailbreak the phone. You'll need physical access to the phone (Hence, the need to temper with the shipping process). And it's not just iPhone. All phones are vulnerable to this. If NSA runs Apple, they don't even need to bother the shipper.
But Android phones are more vulnerable to malware (which will include hacking attempts remotely).
They may not be "doomed" but there is a big difference between the kind of principles that lead to success in the long run and the kind that lead to success only in the short run (e.g. designing your own products, which means you eventually get really good at it, vs. just copying someone else's).
This can't be blamed on competition because revenue is actually up slightly from Q3 2013 and up significantly from Q4 2012. Revenues are perfectly correlated with sales, so sales couldn't have declined unless per-device margins increased.
This drop in profits is due to increased expenses.
Samsung's revenue includes Consumer Electronics department (domestic electronics, like TV), which contributed to that "slightly up revenue". Samsung's Mobile department dropped 9% in revenue and 18% in profit QoQ.
This article is a total farce and sad conclusion to reality. Samsung is the leading android manufacturer with the highest market on the android platform over three years now.
Nobody who really knows about technology buys iphones only clueless joe's uneducated simpletons in technology buy iphones.
Aw butthurt Samsung employee. This is widely reported by everyone. Samsung's fortune is in the decline now. Read it a few times and be angry.
This article is a total farce and sad conclusion to reality. Samsung is the leading android manufacturer with the highest market on the android platform over three years now.
Nobody who really knows about technology buys iphones only clueless joe's uneducated simpletons in technology buy iphones.
Leading android manufacturer - isn't that an oxymoron of some sort?
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
Comments
Your can only fool people for a time,
then they wise up to the game.
It probably has a lot do to with the fact that the S5 is coming out soon -- Apple sales often peaks in 4Q (or 1Q for Apple); then steadily declines until the next iPhone release. Samsung's profit is likely to surpass Apple's in 2Q and 3Q this year.
I think it's pointless to sponsor every single major world sports events (eg, the summer / winter Olympics), or buy celebrity endorsement -- though not all of them are bad (eg, Jay-Z bad, LeBron James cool). Now, I don't think all of Samsung's 2013 marketing budget $13B went into advertising and celebrity endorsements, I heard a large chunk of their marketing expenses pay for rebates, etc, etc.. Anybody know the exact break down?
So, I'm guessing that either the bulk of the $13B was wasted, or the soon to be much more frugal Samsung is going to see a dip in sales and marketshare. Either way, I don't think that the S5 is going to save them, whenever it arrives. Chalk that up to low and mid range competition that will reduce ASP.
Samsung has peaked marketshare. Profits will soon follow. Such is the way of capitalism.
Reading further, consumer electronics was up 18%, but mobile was down 9%.
Seems pretty clear. Samsung sold more electronics goods, but less mobile. And considering Samsung claims a significant increase in tablet sales it can only mean phone sales dropped even more than 9%.
Did you even read the report? Sales were up only 0.3% from Q3. And this is a holiday quarter, the best time of year for a consumer electronics company.
Reading further, consumer electronics was up 18%, but mobile was down 9%.
Seems pretty clear. Samsung sold more electronics goods, but less mobile. And considering Samsung claims a significant increase in tablet sales it can only mean phone sales dropped even more than 9%.
So, just to be clear, you don't disagree with me? Samsung's earnings didn't decrease because of a decrease in sales? Good, I'm glad we're on the same page.
Sooo... it has a lot to do with the S5 coming out? I'd say it had a lot to do with Samsung being unable to peak during the huge Holiday buying frenzy.
Of course there's no breakdown of their advertizing budget, that's where they hide all the bribes and payouts to shills haunting the Apple-cetric blogs. Samsung may be unethical, corrupt and operated by a criminal, but it ain't stupid.
Were you mumbling to yourself or was these comments directed toward someone??
AI's spin on this story differs significantly from the rest of the tech press. It's worth hearing this story from all sides.
So, just to be clear, you don't disagree with me? Samsung's earnings didn't decrease because of a decrease in sales? Good, I'm glad we're on the same page.
He's saying Samsung's mobile phone sales *decreased*, but overall revenue was propped up by other electronics sales.
Increase in marketing expense and holiday shopping should have boosted their mobile phone sales too. Apparently, they didn't help much against low cost alternatives and Apple's new phones.
This article is a total farce and sad conclusion to reality. Samsung is the leading android manufacturer with the highest market on the android platform over three years now.
Nobody who really knows about technology buys iphones only clueless joe's uneducated simpletons in technology buy iphones.
Being king of the turds, still makes somebody a turd. Android is garbage and being the number one garbage maker means nothing.
As for your second statement, which is both incorrect and extremely ignorant, not to mention a tad uneducated, is simply not true. Android is what attracts the simpletons, the clueless, the desperate and the poor who can not afford to purchase anything else. Android is a terrible performing platform, plagued by fragmentation, lag, sloppy performance, sub par apps, malware and viruses. It's a total joke of an OS, used by people who are mostly amateurs and people who can't afford anything else. Android is used by many people as a phone that's only one step above a dumb phone, if even that.
iOS leads in all important categories, in virtually all professional fields. iPhones and iPads are being adopted by a whole multitude of various entities, ranging from government, to science, to healthcare, to retail, to arts, you name it. In each of these places you'll find iOS devices being widely adopted and used. Some people and businesses are even ditching their PC's for iOS devices. Android devices simply do not cut it, when performing most tasks. All sorts of add on accessories, both professional and consumer are made for iOS devices, Android has almost nothing.
Only the most ignorant of the ignorant chooses Android. I would never even hire anybody who showed up with an Android device, as that would tell me all I needed to know about that person.
Wow. And they accuse us of being arrogant.
AI's spin on this story differs significantly from the rest of the tech press. It's worth hearing this story from all sides.
According to Samsung...
"marketing costs and "year-end inventory adjustments" _lowered shipments_ and cut into profits."
?This implies that they had overshipped previously. And before the shopping season, retailers want stagnant products out of their shelves to replace with newer SKUs. This stock rebalancing act means the resellers effectively bought fewer new Samsung phones (The rest were treated as replacements for unsold SKUs).
It is easy to claim demand has increased. Next quarter, Samsung will try to overship again to make up for the "loss in momentum". This is a common phenomenon for companies who stuff the channel aggressively. A few quarters down, they will report another setback again as the channel readjust its inventory another time. This was the game the old Sony played. Kaz Hirai finally got rid of the practice because the channel stuffing game almost brought the electronics division to its knees -- if the prices erode quickly, and currency rate fluctuate. Same things that are happening to Samsung the last quarter and now.
You can already tell the impact of the negative effect since a holiday quarter usually sell 2-3 times a regular quarter. Yet Samsung's profitability dipped instead of increased. That means they had a lot of unsold inventory. When they release S5, these unsold S4, Note, etc. will need to be marked down too. That's why in the last quarter, you see a few Samsung executives fined for trying to prop up their online phone price. They were basically fighting their own system because these poor managers have revenue targets to meet.
As for marketing cost, they will continue to fund the channels, but perhaps more selectively.
EDIT: Forgot to mention that in India, because Apple phased out iPhone 4 last quarter, Samsung were able to capture more marketshare at the low end. This has helped them slightly. But not enough to stop the drop in profit because the margin for these low end phones are too low.
Perhaps Samsung smart phone buyers are finally realizing their android phone is a Google spy in their hands seeing and hearing everything they do.
Your can only fool people for a time,
then they wise up to the game.
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
You "only" need to control the shipper and jailbreak the phone. You'll need physical access to the phone (Hence, the need to temper with the shipping process). And it's not just iPhone. All phones are vulnerable to this. If NSA runs Apple, they don't even need to bother the shipper.
But Android phones are more vulnerable to malware (which will include hacking attempts remotely).
Android Authority disagrees with you:
http://www.androidauthority.com/are-iphone-users-richer-better-educated-than-android-users-105032/
This can't be blamed on competition because revenue is actually up slightly from Q3 2013 and up significantly from Q4 2012. Revenues are perfectly correlated with sales, so sales couldn't have declined unless per-device margins increased.
This drop in profits is due to increased expenses.
Samsung's revenue includes Consumer Electronics department (domestic electronics, like TV), which contributed to that "slightly up revenue". Samsung's Mobile department dropped 9% in revenue and 18% in profit QoQ.
This article is a total farce and sad conclusion to reality. Samsung is the leading android manufacturer with the highest market on the android platform over three years now.
Nobody who really knows about technology buys iphones only clueless joe's uneducated simpletons in technology buy iphones.
Aw butthurt Samsung employee. This is widely reported by everyone. Samsung's fortune is in the decline now. Read it a few times and be angry.
People who don't know about technology buy the cheap android junk and use them as phones. Note the web usage statistics
Leading android manufacturer - isn't that an oxymoron of some sort?
Better be careful with that line of attack unless someone asks the question how could the NSA intercept shipments of iPhones destined for particular individuals and install their spyware on them then pop them back into the shipping process so the altered phone reached the targeted individual? To do that you would almost think you would have to be running Apple or something.
Wow.
You can almost smell the desperation.