Foldable Phones May Be the Future. In South Korea, They're the Present
Foldable Phones
Speaker 1: Phones that fold in half may be new to most people, but here and sold the capital of Samsung's home country of South Korea. You can find them almost everywhere you go. Multiple smartphones have been around since 2019, but they haven't taken off in the US an account for just a fraction of global smartphone sales. Still the market is growing with market research firm, the International Data Corporation estimating that shipments will grow more than 50% [00:00:30] in 2023 compared to 2022. And Samsung is the dominant player making up 62% of the market in the first half of last year. According to counterpoint research, Samsung's large presence in South Korea has made Seoul a sort of foldable capital of the world, the perfect place to find out what people really like about them and if they could become mainstream here in the us. [00:01:00] I wandered around the streets of Seoul and was able to speak with Z flip and Z fold owners about their devices and why they bought them. They were everywhere. The streets of Gangnam, Guang Jong Market, the popular Starfield Mall, you name it, the most common device we spotted, Samsung's, galaxy Z Flip. Nearly all the flip owners I talked to said one of the biggest appeals is the design.
Speaker 1: [00:01:30] Uck Kim, an IT project manager, has a Galaxy Z fold. Samsung's larger foldable. He says he enjoys using it for work since he can view PowerPoints and message coworkers at the same time.
Speaker 2: [00:02:00] It
Speaker 1: Wasn't all compliments, though. Some pointed out the downsides of owning a foldable phone,
Speaker 1: But not everyone has a foldable, and [00:02:30] it's worth noting a lot of the flat smartphones we saw were iPhones. But in my hometown of New York, I rarely see foldable phones in the wild at all. South Korea was one of the largest markets for foldable phones last year behind only the much larger regions of China, north America, and Europe. Samsung's new flagship store in the upscale Gangnam district shows how the company is trying to woo customers who aren't intrigued by design. It's unlike any electronic [00:03:00] store I've ever seen. It's filled with pastel colors. There's a cafe, an auditorium, and of course the Z flip is at the center of it all. There's a special area where you can buy exclusive Z flip accessories you won't be able to find elsewhere. And given that design seems to be the top reason why South Koreans I've spoken to are interested in the Z flip, that's a big deal.
Speaker 1: Yes, South Korea is Samsung's hometown and the company's technology is [00:03:30] popular there, but it wouldn't be the first time new mobile technology has taken off in South Korea before going mainstream elsewhere. Phones with larger screens were popular in South Korea and China, for example, long before they became the norm. In other parts of the world, perhaps Samsung is hoping that Foldables will take a similar path, setting the stage for the next big shift in how we use our phones. It could be why Samsung decided to launch its newest foldables in seo, but Samsung has a lot of challenges to overcome, [00:04:00] the biggest of which is price. These phones are still very expensive with the Galaxy Z fold five starting at $1,800, and Samsung now has more competition from rivals like Google and Motorola, both of which just launched their own new foldable devices. Only time will tell if Foldables do become the next big thing, but if that does happen, I'll always remember that I saw them everywhere here in Seoul first.
