Hello everyone. Welcome to a new week. Today’s update will have a Samsung theme. We begin with Neil’s thoughts on Samsung announcing its first Unpacked event in South Korea. The announcement caught Neil’s attention for a few reasons. The discussion then turns to the current state of foldables in 2023. We conclude with Samsung reportedly rethinking its headset approach after seeing Apple Vision Pro.

Let’s jump right in.

Samsung Announces Foldables Event in Seoul

Here’s The Korea Times:

“Samsung Electronics will hold its Galaxy Unpacked event in Seoul at the end of July, to introduce its latest foldable smartphones, the company said Wednesday.

According to the company, the 27th Galaxy Unpacked event will be held at the COEX convention center in southern Seoul, which will be the first Unpacked event in Korea. Though Samsung did not officially announce the name of the products, it is expected that the Galaxy Z Flip 5 and the Z Fold 5 foldable smartphones will be unveiled at the event.

Samsung began holding Galaxy Unpacked in March 2010 with the unveiling of the first Galaxy S Model in Las Vegas and has since held the unveiling events in major cities around the world, including New York, San Francisco, London, Berlin and Barcelona…

Speaking about why it decided to hold the event on its home soil for the first time, Samsung said it aims to assure the world of its pride as the originator of foldable smartphones at a time when Chinese rivals and Google have also been launching foldable products.

‘Since the company first introduced foldable smartphones in 2019, it has been improving the perfection of foldable smartphones and growing the market every year. As a result, we've seen that latecomers are joining the market. Under these circumstances, Samsung plans to unveil a new foldable product in Korea to make its pride as a foldable originator clear to the world,’ Samsung said."

This announcement caught my attention for a few reasons.

Samsung has relied on a revolving host city strategy for the past 13 years of Unpacked product unveilings. While there was never an obvious direct theme between the Samsung products being announced and the location where the products were unveiled, one could have made the connection of Samsung hosting events where it wanted to make the most (cultural) impact. Up to now, that has primarily been the U.S. and Europe.

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