This time last week I was sitting in a glammed-up helicopter hangar in north Jozi, munching my way through the proffered finger foods as a line-up of glossy influencers and suited execs took us through the features of Samsung’s latest devices at the Galaxy Unpacked event. It was my first in-person, real-life tech launch in two years, and the phrase that kept occurring to me was “nature is healing”.
Remember that? In the early eerie first lockdowns — which now feel decidedly like “ye olde days of yore” — any picture of an urban fox or dolphins in the Hudson River (New York) prompted a series of social posts and articles on how animals were reclaiming our unnervingly empty cityscapes. It was so prevalent that it soon became a running joke online. Much of it (the apparent rewilding) has since sadly been debunked, but we will always have the memes.
It’s been a long few years without tech launches for me. They’ve been something of a mainstay since the beginning of my career when (I suspect) I got given the tech beat by virtue of being the youngest person in the newsroom. Of course, they kept happening virtually, which meant logging in to a global webcast from my bedroom, and sometimes I was relieved to skip the last-minute travel plans and transfer buses, the hurry-up-and-wait of organised group travel.
Mostly, though, I’ve missed them. I’ve missed the anticipation of reveal, the feeling of being “in the know”, and the cast of recurring characters — tech journalism is a niche job in SA — with whom I’ve travelled to Las Vegas, Berlin, Lagos and every possible eventing venue in Joburg. So sitting there, fingers poised for the frantic post-embargo tweeting, it felt like a return to the old normal — if you studiously ignored the face masks and sanitiser.
For a gadget groupie like myself, there’s nothing quite like stepping into the curtained-off “experience zone” after the slick AV presentations have wrapped up, and getting hands-on with the latest flagship mobile or tablet. They glint and gleam under strategic lighting, and you can pore over (and paw) the hardware, before (typically) launching the camera app to marvel at how it has levelled up in a single generation.
So sitting there, fingers poised for the frantic postembargo tweeting, it felt like a return to the old normal — if you studiously ignored the face masks and sanitiser
That is true still for the Samsung S22 range that was being unveiled last week — especially the S22 Ultra, which feels like the perfect blend of the S and Note ranges, complete with S-Pen stylus. The cameras on this machine are heavyweights, remarkably capable in the most challenging photography spheres: low light, telephoto, motion-compensating.
There’s a lot more to this device than camera tech, including the Dynamic Amoled 2X adaptive display, AI-enhanced editing, and the latest 4nm processor, but I will leave the full breakdown of specs to the reviewers.
From a macro perspective, the S22 Ultra is a big play for the world’s leading smartphone maker. Outside the US, where Apple is king, these two giant brands have been locked in step with each other for years. In the fourth quarter of 2021, for example, Apple took the global lead, shipping 80-million to 81.5-million units — buoyed by demand for the new iPhone 13 series, which was released in September — compared to Samsung’s 67.5-million to 69-million units.
The range in the numbers quoted here, within each brand, depends on which market analysts’ figures you use: Strategy Analytics or Counterpoint Research. Still, overall in 2021 Strategy Analytics says Samsung was the top manufacturer with 20% global market share, ahead of Apple’s 16.8%.
Quarter for quarter, region for region, and even category for category, you can see the tussle playing out in the data. At the same event last week Samsung also launched a few new tablets (Galaxy Tab S8 range) that will set hearts aflutter, especially for anyone in creative or design-focused jobs. The bulk of the market share for tablets, however, remains Apple territory. The International Data Corporation places Apple’s global share at 34.2% in 2021 compared with 18.3% for Samsung. However, as Arthur Goldstuck wrote for BusinessLIVE last week, the roles are reversed in Southern Africa, where Samsung accounts for 32.7% and Apple a mere 7.4%.
Price factor
These regional differences give us a glimpse into possible strategy plays for the big tech brands, and will become increasingly important in years to come — as youthful, connected populations thrive outside the developed nations. In India, for example, Apple iPhone sales grew by over a third in 2021 to 2.3-million units, according to Counterpoint. India is the world’s fastest-growing smartphone market and is dominated by Xiaomi and Samsung. Despite its hunger for devices, it is a developing nation with a price-sensitive consumer base … much like our own.
To take the lead in such places, Apple will have to find a way to compete as much on price as it does in brand recognition and sheer tech capability.
Perhaps that’s why the trade-in offer Samsung announced last week got almost more interest from the jaded journo crowd than the specs and features of the devices themselves. Bring in a recent Samsung flagship (from S10 and Note 10 Lite up), and as long as it switches on, the trade-in value is a whopping R10,000. That takes the price of the S22 Ultra from a frankly painful R29,000 to a much more stomach-able R19,000. Read the T&Cs, of course, and let’s not pretend R20,000 isn’t an unimaginable amount for the average South African, but still I’m jazzed to see a good ol’ fashioned price war shaping up in top-tier devices.
Maybe, just maybe, the open market is finally delivering on its textbook promises of competition dynamics for flagship smartphones. The brand that gets the balance between ego and wallet just right will be well positioned to make emerging markets theirs at just the right time.
• Thompson Davy, a freelance journalist, is an impactAFRICA fellow and WanaData member.
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