LG will stop releasing new smartphones on a specific schedule

It’s no secret that LG has been struggling mightily as it continues to battle against the likes of Apple and Samsung, but the company has just reported its 11th straight quarter with a loss in its mobile division. This has sparked a new idea within the company, and LG’s Vice Chairman Cho Sung-Jin confirmed the company will no longer follow a regular release timeline for new devices.

“We will unveil new smartphones when it is needed. But we will not launch it just because other rivals do,” 

This is an interesting strategy, but if LG wants to continue making moves in the smartphone world, it may be a business plan that may just work. HTC kind of confirmed that it would be doing the same thing, but instead of releasing a boatload of new devices every year, HTC will be shrinking down to just a couple of new smartphones.

Whether Sung-Jin’s statement means that the company will be changing its release schedule for the LG G7 and LG V40, remains to be seen. Instead, he stated that the company plans “to retain existing models longer by, for instance, unveiling more variant models of the G series or V series”.

It’s possible that we could begin seeing more and more variants of the flagships released by LG, but at odd times throughout the year. There’s also no secret that it’s tough for LG to keep up with Samsung, as both company’s flagship devices usually launch around the same time.

The LG G6 launched ahead of schedule in 2017, but the device was met with a lot of kickback due to the fact that it was using the Snapdragon 821 chipset and not the new Snapdragon 835. Instead, LG waited until the LG V30 before debuting a device that featured Qualcomm’s latest chipset, and one that was already seen in the likes of the Galaxy S8 lineup, HTC U11, Galaxy Note 8, OnePlus 5, and others.

We are still expecting for LG to release the G7 (or whatever it’s called) at Mobile World Congress 2018, but the device will likely be overshadowed by the Galaxy S9 lineup. 2018 is shaping up to be quite an interesting year, but it still seems that Samsung won’t have to really compete with any other OEM in the Android space, allowing it to solely focus on what Apple is working on.