Samsung’s cheaper Galaxy A phones get the spotlight at Unpacked

Samsung tends to use its flashy Unpacked opportunities to showcase the latest leading articles in their Galaxy S, Galaxy Note and Melkweg Z families of telephones. But this is the company’s middle A-series, which started at $ 110 last year, which will be central during its next major product event.

At 07:00 PT Wednesday, Samsung presents its second virtual Unpacked event of 2021. Samsung called Wednesday’s event ‘Galaxy Awesome Unpacked’ and said it would explain how it’s bringing Awesome to everyone ‘. (Yes, capital letter “A” is fantastic). The first unpacked, mid-January, was the launch of Samsung’s flagship phones for the year, the Galaxy S21, S21 Plus and S21 Ultra. Everyone comes with 5G, and the devices starts at $ 800, which is $ 200 less than their predecessors.

The Galaxy S is perhaps Samsung’s most striking flagship series, and the Galaxy Z-foldable is its future, but none offers the most popular devices the South Korean giant sells. According to Galaxy Analytics, the Galaxy A, which last year represented more than three out of every four Samsung phones shipped worldwide. The steady rise of the line as a major contributor to sales for Samsung underscores the idea that while the best specs and latest features are good for attention and buzz, people still care about what they spend on phones – especially in these times .

Samsung will bring more attention to the lineup than ever when it makes the Galaxy A the focus of Wednesday’s Unpacked. 

When Samsung first jumped into the Android market in 2010, it was with its Galaxy S devices, which propelled the Korean company to the position of world’s biggest phone vendor, a title it’s held for most of the past decade. Similarly, the Galaxy Note ignited a trend for jumbo phones and the Galaxy Fold touched off a new wave of foldables.

Generating much less fanfare is the Galaxy A lineup. The phones have been viewed as devices for people who are more price-sensitive — if anyone thought about the A Series at all. They’ve been sold internationally for years but didn’t come to the US as a full lineup until 2020.

In the past, “every time [Samsung] Ken Hyers, strategic analyst at Strategy Analytics, made the S-Series roll out, even after transportation company subsidies disappeared. phone.”

Last year’s Galaxy A series included four 4G LTE phones and two 5G models. They ranged from $ 110 for the Galaxy A10 to $ 650 for the Galaxy A71 5G on Verizon’s network (it’s $ 600 at other service providers without superfast 5G millimeter wave connection). All have some excellent features, though they were not nearly as premium as the specs in the Galaxy S, Note and Foldable. And no one was close to the price for Samsung’s premium phones, which started at $ 1,000 for the Galaxy S20. While the Galaxy A series may not have the flash of Samsung’s luxury phones, there are many buyers around the world.

In the US, where there is often a larger market for expensive phones than in many other regions, A-Series shipments exceeded those of the S-Series, 26% to 19%, according to Strategy Analytics. In the most important fourth quarter of the year, nearly half of Samsung’s phone shipments in the US come from the A-Series. It included models like the $ 180 Galaxy A11, $ 250 Galaxy A21 and $ 500 Galaxy A51 5G.

People are increasingly choosing cheaper phones, even if they can afford the more expensive models like the Galaxy S, Hyers of Strategy Analytics said.

The telephone market of today looks very different from the industry a few years ago. In the past, many consumers bought the latest and greatest on a regular two-year cadence, and Apple and Samsung made $ 1000 the default starting price for luxury phones. People in the United States are now content with an additional year to hold on to their phones, and when they upgrade, they often look for cheaper phones. Today’s mainstream devices are equipped with much better features – such as fast processors, large screens and multiple camera lenses – which consumers consider good enough, especially for the price. Samsung even lowers starting price of its Galaxy S series by $ 200 for this year’s S21 models.

“The price of premium products has gone awry with what people justify for a smartphone,” Hyers said. “And phones like the A51 … do not feel that you are compromising.”

Samsung declined to comment before Wednesday’s event.

The new A-Series

This year, Samsung is expected to launch the Galaxy A52 and A72 phones, the successors of last year’s A51 and A71. The devices will likely be introduced immediately with 4G and 5G variants (last year’s 5G models arrived after the 4G versions) and several improvements over the older models.

It is rumored that the A52 will have a larger battery, a better processor and more RAM, while retaining the 6.5-inch Super AMOLED screen found in the A51. The A72 is believed to feature a new camera design, with five rear lenses, a first for any Samsung device. It can also become the first mid-range phone with optical image stabilization to optimize the recordings.

The refresh of the higher end of the A-Series could give a lower boost to Samsung’s unit sales than the introduction of newer cheaper models. These are the company’s cheapest Galaxy A models that appear to be the most popular with consumers, said Mark Bachman, chief technology and telecommunications analyst at M Science. His firm monitors how well phone models sell.

Looking at the first 20 weeks of sales for each device, the data analytics provider found that budget models, such as the $ 180 Galaxy A10e and A11 or the $ 250 A20 and A21, sold in higher numbers than the most expensive $ 500 A51 5G and $ 600 A71 5G (or $ 650 at Verizon). U.S. consumers bought nearly 2.5 million units of the A11 in the first five months of sales, while buying only about 300,000 Galaxy A51 5G units.

“While the launch of the A52 / A72 series will refresh Samsung’s mid-range offering, we believe these phones will have less impact on Samsung’s sales compared to their inexpensive A-Series and premium S devices,” said Bachman.

However, Samsung has not yet said what the new A-Series devices will cost. This could lower the prices for the models, like how it lowers the price of Galaxy S.

Hit the ‘sweet spot’

Samsung is highlighting its cheaper phones according to a trend prevalent in the mobile industry. The first 5G devices on the market in 2019 costs significantly more than their 4G counterparts. Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G and Galaxy Note 10 Plus 5G both sold for $ 1,300. That’s $ 400 and $ 200 more than the 4G variants, respectively.

But the coronavirus pandemic has forced companies to do so reevaluate their launch plans and lower prices for 5G phones much faster than expected. In September, Samsung launches its Galaxy S20 FE for $ 300 less than its S20 sibling. In January, Samsung announced that its new Galaxy S21 models would cost $ 200 less than their Galaxy S20 sibling of a year earlier. This is partly because component costs have dropped, but also the recognition that it’s getting harder to convince people to pay $ 1,000 for a phone.

The Galaxy S21 series meets ‘sweet spots’ in the market in terms of pricing and features, Drew Blackard, Samsung Electronics America’s vice president of product management, said in an interview ahead of the Unpacked event in January. And he said the bottom starting point is probably here to stay.

The Galaxy A devices are even cheaper, without sacrificing features like powerful cameras.

A new smartphone that won’t let your bank account tap is perhaps worth it for all the unpacked fanfare.