Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. on Wednesday unveiled three new smartphones with advanced cameras, enhanced productivity and more powerful batteries and storage — at comparable prices from a year ago.
The kitchen-sink approach to Samsung’s annual Galaxy launch comes amid a device recession, and after Apple Inc. AAPL also maintained its prices on its latest round of new iPhones. Smartphone shipments endured a decline of 11% or more last year, according to third-party analyses, with Gartner predicting another 4% decline in 2023.
While improvements to the S23 are the kind of incremental enhancements that consumers and analysts have come to expect in the smartphone market, Samsung’s pricing strategy is an acknowledgment of a market that requires lower-cost smartphones to spur consumer sales. Rapid inflation worldwide has forced consumers to focus more of their budgets on necessities, leading to longer waits to refresh electronic devices.
That competitive pricing is impacting the South Korean electronics giant’s bottom line, though. Samsung’s quarterly profits plunged to their lowest level in eight years, down 69% year-over-year to $3.5 billion, in holiday-quarter results released Tuesday.