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With news that Apple managed to sell over 10 million units of the new iPhone devices (those being the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6+), Samsung is sweating a bit — so much so that they’ve reportedly brought the launch of the device up to a nearer date. According to the Korea Times, Samsung is now planning to launch the phone on major South Korean carriers this Friday, September 26th. The device was originally billed for an October release.
The timing for Samsung makes sense as Apple has not yet launched in all of their planned markets. The initial launch weekend only invited folks from the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Puerto Rico, Singapore and the UK to the party.
Apple’s second phase — this Friday — takes place in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey and United Arab Emirates.
Beyond responding to Apple’s sudden launch of the latest iPhone units by adjusting their timing, Samsung also wants to undercut prices. Not only is their own phone being offered cheaper than any of the iPhone models, but it’s now being offered for less than any other Note device has debuted at:
In Korea, the suggested retail price for the Note 4 was set at 957,000 won without contracts ― the lowest price tag since Samsung opened its phablet chapter with the Note series in 2011. The Note 1 was priced at 999,000 won, while the Notes 2 and 3 were sold for 1.08 million won and 1.06 million won, respectively, to Korean consumers.
It’s clear Samsung has a lot riding on this launch. For years they’ve been marketing to what was largely seen as a niche audience of folks who desired huge, high resolution displays.
HTC and LG ultimately caught on and began to challenge Samsung in that particular space, but that wasn’t enough to keep each iteration of the Note line from reaching 10 million unit sales. With Apple into the mix, things just got a whole lot more interesting.
Now more than ever, Samsung has to work hard to convince consumers their “big phone” is more than just a “big phone.” Unique additions like the Wacom-powered S Pen experience and a superior multi-tasking system should give them enough to go toe-to-toe with Apple. Samsung’s also created a timely marketing campaign to help show folks that they’ve been at this phablet game for years, and they’ll need to make sure they capitalize on that with a launch sooner rather than later.
Samsung believes they can sell about 15 million units with its first 30 days of going on sale despite increased pressure from Apple. That would be a remarkable feat as it took them a couple of months to reach that mark for last year’s Galaxy Note 3.
It doesn’t sound like they’re expecting to reach Apple’s numbers within just 3 days, though you’ll have to remember that the Note 4 won’t be launching in nearly as many markets on day one as the iPhone 6 and 6+ did. Reaching even just 10 million sales within the first month would be huge for Samsung.
There’s still no clue when the rest of the world will be able to get their hands on the Galaxy Note 4, though their estimation makes it sound like they won’t be waiting far into October. Be sure to read our iPhone 6+ vs Samsung Galaxy Note 4 comparison for a better idea of how these two behemoths stack up to each other, and stay on the lookout for more coverage in the weeks to come!
I’m actually surprised that Samsung is worrying so much about one phone. There’s been so much comparison about the 6 Plus to the Note Family. But what about the comparison of the 6 to the smaller family of phones?
And that’s pretty impressive if Samsung thinks they can sell 15 million Notes in 30 days. Apple makes two phones now, and sold 10 million in just two days. How many phones does Samsung make? I would have guessed the Note 4 would have been geared to a much smaller audience.
Which, I will be upgrading my Note 2 to the 4 this November.
Samsung had the category of the phablet phones primarily to itself since no other Android phablet phone sells anywhere near the Galaxy Note series. With Apple now in the picture, that exclusive advantage Sammy had is going to erode quickly.
Gee really Samsung? Maybe you should of thought of this when you announced on Sept 3rd (and launching Oct 17th? lol horrible gameplan) and totally knowing what you were up against Sept 9th then 19th makes it even worse.
How about this? >Announce and launch same day, do something amazing like that, that def would stop the iPone bleeding, maybe next time sammy, maybe next time
I don’t know how well the announce and launch on the same day would work, especially if retailers aren’t aware of the announcement and don’t have stock. Read up on how Sega handled the launch of the Sega Saturn (thanks to the impending launch on the original PlayStation) and how they horribly botched it.
My main point was that Sammy wants to beat apple more than any other company and the world knew a big iPhone was coming. So announcing on Sept 3rd for Oct 17th, knowing iPhones previous schedules was a total and epic fail and them moving up the date proves it
I don’t disagree with that.
I couldnt agree more. Samsung is going to regret this.
I honestly haven’t seen or heard about anyone ditching their notes for the new iPhone. I got to hold one on Saturday night and its honestly not even in the same class as the Note as far as productivity is concerned. The thing is HUGE with a smaller screen. It also is ridiculously tall compared to the Note which has a bigger screen with a smaller overall footprint.
Lol, and the iphone bends in pockets.
http://www.ubergizmo.com/2014/09/iphone-6-plus-handsets-reportedly-bends-while-in-pocket/?utm_source=mobilerepublic
So lame. This is APPLE’S WORST NIGHTMARE! No one will buy it now
haha lol, hope this isnt a huge issue for them
Agreed, but an average user who likes big screens (read Asians), will probably consider the iPhone. It a tad more expensive but its trendier :)
Ahh…I’m waiting for the Galaxy S6, hopefully with the Snapdragon 810 and USB Type-C connector, those two things I want in my next Galaxy S6!
Meh, once you go wireless charging, you really don’t care what the shape of the cable that came with your phone looks like.
I think and I could be wrong that worrying what apple is doing may bite them in the butt big time someday. Samsung should get over Apple and try to play heavy to the android crowd before someone like LG or Motorola comes up and shanks them from behind. ( in sales and innovation obviously ) hell a lot of people already seem pretty convinced that LG and Sony are already on there way there.
My point is. It’s a lot easier to win over a current android user to your phones than an iOS user.
One can argue that in order to be the man you have to beat the man. Sure they can spend their time and energy trying to send LG and HTC and the likes out of business. But Samsung is already dominating android market. There is no doubt their biggest competition is Apple. They have reached that level of brand awareness with the general population. I think it would be a little silly to stop worrying about apple’s 150 million user base and turn their attention to LG’s 10 million base.
Oh Samsung is getting hurt bigtime in the mid to small price phone market with the chinese phones and showing in numbers already. Samsung is getting it from both ends. I think Samsung makes to many phones and even variants of one model.
LG? Sony? Motorola? lol.
I like all those companies phones but none of them have the reach that Samsung does.
What ever people say the Galaxy Note series is the best phablet in the market. All the other phablet phones are larger phones instead of a phablet. Only the Galaxy Note offers us most advanced and useful features such as
* Smart Select
* Photo Note
* S Pen
* Multi-Window multitasking
* Fast charging
* Image cropping
The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus never come close to the Galaxy Note 4. What to do Samsung, Apple has more loyal customers than you. Therefore, iPhones always sell more than Samsung phones. No matter, my choice is the Note 4. I love the Exynos version. The Snapdragon 805 is no where near to the Exynos 5433 and Exynos version has a much better GPU.
Anyway, I’m not going to buy a Note 4 because it is too big for me, hopefully my brother will buy. He is so eager about the Note 4. I’m waiting for the next year Galaxy S6 and HTC M9.
you can also argue that samsung’s just taking advantage of the situation since you’re hearing everywhere that the 6 Plus is backordered for awhile. i do agree that it’s somewhat poor timing by samsung having some idea when apple would announce and ship their product but there’s probably more reason to this than what the public can see. perhaps it had to do with the shipping time of the snapdragon 805 since this would be the first smartphone to have it?
still waiting on the note edge release date for t-mobile :(
YASS!!!! :)
People you are forgetting something and that is competition. Thanks to Apple we are getting the phone earlier than expected and as well cheaper.
Wait a month after release and they may go cheaper on contract. Wouldnt be surprised $99 or cheaper.
I am quite surprised by this move. In all honesty, it’s the Apple fanboys that are buying the iPhone 6 variants. Being bigger doesn’t put it on even playing grounds. The note is much better as far as productivity and features. And it’ll have a better camera, the iPhone 6 is quite disappointing. I just hope this move doesn’t happier the quality of the note 4. For me, I’ll be waiting patiently for the note edge. I have had several phones but always find myself going to the note. It is the best.
Oh it;s not just fanboys, A lot of people that android to get a larger screen are coming back to the 6 now that they have more options. and people that were on the fence are not. hardware wise the new iphone is nice and heard good things on camera and battery on the plus. wife going 6 plus after seeing one up close and i tried to offer my g2 to test out for a while but she was already sold. Samsung messed up. The announced ahead of time and should have made the most of releasing a week or so before.
In all my friends and colleagues who use android devices, none of them is moving to the iPhone 6. In all my friends and colleagues who use an iPhone, only half of them are willing to move to the iPhone6 (the other say it’s too big).
Samsung has really borked the launch of the Note 4. They should have had it ready to be released before the iPhone and it was announced way too far ahead of the release date they are going with. I am trying to find somewhere to get an international version so that I don’t have to put up with the garbage on the AT&T version, but there is still so little information out there.
Competition is good for us all! Sooner release date, and maybe that price reduction will find its way stateside. Make 32GB the “standard” (16GB is pretty puny these days). The only spec I see where they dropped the ball is SD card only to 64GB for this device.
the larger sd card will still undoubtedly work. My note 3 (and note 8) both have 128gb sd cards in them and work just swimmingly. Don’t worry about it.
There is no structural difference between a 64GB and a 128GB card. If one works, the other will too.
Come again? 2^6 = 64 and 2^7 = 128. My EE background is a bit rusty, but wouldn’t there be some type of dependency on the memory bus width (or similar param) of the Device? I mean why not just be compatible with 256GB as well at 2^8? Please Explain. Thanks.
Yes, they will also be compatible with 256GB cards when these are out, they don’t exist yet :)
What I meant is 64GB and 128GB cards both use the same technology (SDXC), which supports up to 2TB… So it’s quite future-proof for a few years at least :)
The previous technology, SDHC, supported only up to 32GB, so some devices (phones or USB adaptors) were actually limited to 32GB if they didn’t support SDXC.
apple has been successful in amassing a huge cult following that is religious in it’s devotion. the only thing the new iphone brings to the table is that it’s a new iphone. samsung should just chill out and focus on putting a quality device out on the market.
apple is a cult. it is what it is.
I assume that this won’t have any affect on the US carriers launch dates?
Samsung is really scared now. They know the iPhone 6 Plus is going to eat away at their Note 4 sales quickly since the 6 Plus is constantly sold out. Thus accelerating the Note 4 launch.
I don’t know that it will eat away at anything. The thing about these huge apple launches is that it is always all the apple faithful upgrading their phones at the same time because the mother ship tells them too. What made this launch exceptional from the last few is that it was actually something different from the last one. Apple usually doesn’t get a lot of increased market share out of a new launch, after all, their feature set is still years behine what is being done on Android.
I feel like there were a bunch of people who switched to Android simply for the bigger screen. Apple is offering that now, I’m guessing there will be people who switch back.
Well it sure as hell won’t be me, so take me off your list. ;)
I agree, but know that the Note 4 features and smart pen makes the Note series more than just a phone. In the case of Iphone 6+, it is just a big phone.
Agree but not all large screen users care to use stylus. People need large screen good featured smartphone.
Had someone in my office switch from a Samsung phone to the iPhone 6 plus. But another coworker is switching to android. I’m not sure there is going to be much of a net change.
I am one of Android user who left ipone after 4s due to screen size and bought 4.7″ LG optimus G e970. Now going back to iphone 6. Millions of android users can’t get OS updates for even 1 year old phones and android phones are dime a dozen from Chinese manufacturers. Time to go back to iphone home.
I’m hoping that happens.
None of the major Android players are going to close shop (HTC, I’m looking nervously at you as I say that) just because apple finally listened to people and stopped being stubborn.
As such, loss of market share might be exactly what is needed to get some real innovation beyond fitness tracking apps and higher resolutions.
There is little doubt that Apple finally released a larger screen to satisfy that part of the market….but I don’t think it is about them listening to people. I think they have been happy to slowly increase their market share of the overall sales from year to year. This is about inclemently growing sales again which is enough to keep all the Apple staff employed for another year. I think it is called sustainable growth where you just grow your profits at small rate. Otherwise you end up like a company like HP or MS who have been laying off thousands in the last couple of years.
Apple has copied/emulated/whatever a ton of very useful Android features (notification bar, third-party keyboards, etc etc), and now they have similar sized screens. So there’s that as well. I like the competition though. I took a look at the phones at AT&T. They seemed pretty nice although they were taller than they ought to be.
For a decent amount of people, they were quite comfortable with Apple, but all they wanted was a bigger screen. Now they have it.
LAWD!!! Not the Mother Ship :p
In Asia the iPhone 6 Plus is bringing tons of people back to Apple who owned Note 2 and 3s. These people generally don’t use the S-Pen, and only chat, surf, FB, and watch videos.
I don’t think they’re scared. LOL Samsung sells more than 50% of all android phones. Android has more than 80% of all phone sales. Apple sells less than 15% of all phones.
I did read that their market share is slipping as they are being squeezed but :good enough” cheaper Android handsets and iPhone 6/6 Plus/other Android premium handsets.
I also heard Samsung is moving 500 engineers (supposedly) to increase efforts in getting Tizen out the door….they must be a bit scared.
I’m not sure how you think them working on their own OS makes them scared. They have been talking about it for a while this is nothing new. Just like any company they are constantly looking to increase their profits. Which is why they want their own OS so you have to buy from their digital store.
With all the leaks with Apple’s iPhone 6 launches, Samsung should really have pushed the same day release or earlier…. this one is really Samsung’s fall.
Was thinking the exact same thing. It’s not like Samsung doesn’t also make the chip for Apple. Someone on the inside should have known and brought this date up earlier.
Also, Apple always (with the exception of the first couple of iterations) releases around this time.
Just thought I would point out that Apple designs the chip…they then outsource the manufacturing to others.
If they decide to release it in America on September 26 (My birthday) I’ll be ecstatic!
Same here
Welp, guess all purchasers should expect software updates soon to patch bugs they are most like still addressing. Let’s just hope there isn’t any manufacturing defects. Never good to rush. As the saying goes “haste makes waste”. If Samsung screws up going head to head with the iPhone 6, it will be hard to recover it’s reputation.
If you are confident of your product than you don’t have to worry to move launch date up. Iphone 6/Plus is real beauty with loads of features/functions impressing many android users to switch. I have LG optimus G e970 AT&T and ready to convert. What I learned using android phone is yes you get a bit cheaper but it comes with it’s own issues like plastic poor built, software updates are hard to come, so many android phones around and coming out that devalue your own android phone in few months.So, this time I will try iphone 6 plus for good.
Lol.
Not often you see consumer choice as a negative.
So, what I’m gathering from your comment is that you never used an Android phone.
What I learned today is that iFans really really need to shut up about build quality.
I’ve been saying it for years. I don’t get how Samsung thinks that announcing a phone well over a month before launch is a good idea. Not only do people in their own market begin to forget about the phone, but it definitely won’t grasp the attention of other mobile OS users either. I just can’t believe they’re still doing it…
Well I bought an LG g3 but by announcing early they def made me consider holding off to try note 4 in person
Looks like the iphone 6+ is going back to the recycle factory. Lots of disappointed iboys with bent phones. Not a good way to start a new product line. #bendgate
Don’t worry! The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus are now reporting bending! The metal bends easily in pockets and damaging glass! Google it… it’s now being called BENDGATE! The Note 3 did not bend during the test. This is VERY good news for Samsung.
Lol. I’ve seen alot of comments from apple whores saying this is the last straw, they are going Android. Overpriced, 3 year old specs and features, and now it bends in ur pocket. Awesome.
If Samsung is smart, they will push the release of the note 4 in the USA to this or next week. They should also put out ads with people trying to bend the note 4 and being unable to do so.
Apple will most likely call that a revolutionary feature: they have the first phone with a flexible moving screen!
Why do none of these articles mention Apple only sold 10 million combined 6 and 6plus that’s like if you counted s5 and note 4 sales, plus there are videos showing most people waiting in line for iPhone were just reselling them (greatly increasing day one demand) , plus Samsung will throw a couple million alpha sales in for good measure.
Google bendgate.