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Samsung: “We’ll kill the iPod too!”

Yet again, another company plans to kill the iPod:

“What’s the difference between how they have gone to market and how we have gone to market? It’s real simple. They spent $165 million last year to advertise Apple MP3 products. We spent $1 million,” Weedfald said. “We are going to break the code. In 2006, we are going to over-invest in advertising and marketing around these really hot, new digital video and digital audio products, and we will spend tens of millions of dollars.”

Overinvest in advertising and marketing? The best part of the iPod is the buzz?

Oh wait, it gets better. How does Samsung plan to do what everyone else has tried in the past 5 years and succeed?

In North America, Samsung will launch more than 180 new products or upgrades to existing products, according to Weedfald. For over a year, it has released a new cell phone in North America every two weeks, he said.

“The moniker we want to be known for is as a jaunty, flinty, spirited technology leader,” he said. “The way you have to do that is continue to come out with technology breakthroughs.”

Many of the company’s music players will sport dual functionality. The Helix and Nexus MP3 players, unfurled at CES, come with an integrated XM satellite radio receiver. The devices took about four and half months to concoct from conception to final product, Weedfald said.

Other products will combine a portable TV with a music player.

Samsung will also try to jumpstart the portable video market this year. Some portable video devices will be primarily video players, while others will be phones or MP3 players first.

So they’re going to throw a barrage of products, repeatedly, with a bunch of semi-complete features (that’s been the history of these “multi-function” devices, and I see no reason to think that Samsung will pursue a different path, especially considering their jack-of-all-trades phones) that won’t entice people.

Great strategy, guys!

If Samsung thinks they can beat Apple in their market by producing multifunction devices that are outdated two weeks after people buy them and running the company into bankruptcy while advertising the hell out of them, one thing’s for sure. We won’t see a whole lot of Samsung MP3 players on people’s hips come this spring.

I believe I addressed something like this in my last post about some other iPod killer:

Companies are throwing so much crap out there and updating them so fast that it turns people off. Players from iRiver, Samsung, Toshiba, and Creative are exchanged out of store showcases so fast people don’t even want them. In fact, give yourself a little test. Walk into Best Buy (I hate it but it’s to make a point) and look at the variations other manufacturers are offering.

Wait a month.

Go back into Best Buy and look at what they’re offering.

If they have no confidence in their offerings, why should consumers?

I think Samsung just went a long way toward proving exactly what I was saying.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 10th, 2006 at 7:43 am and is filed under Geeky. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

Viewing 4 Comments

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    • v
    While I don't think anyone is going to dethrone Apple in this arena anytime soon, I think Samsung is probably better positioned than most. Samsung has really turned around in terms of design and quality in the last five years or so. They are focusing on attractive, reliable technology that is reasonably priced. When we consider that Apple seems able only to produce one of those three attributes (hint: it's the first one), it's not necessarily all that far-fetched.

    Personally, I have owned only Samsung cell-phones (excluding the Motorola/NexTel crap with which some previous employers have seen fit to weigh down my pants), and they have been reliable and inexpensive. And many people have commented on how great my X475 looks. The one area Samsung needs to work on is UI. Their phone UI is not the best, and needs some attention, but other than that, they're great.

    All that aside, I totally agree that this "iPod killer" talk is getting old - especially since all the killers have consistently been killed themselves. Here's a thought - turn off the hype machine and produce your device! Afterall, the most effective killers are always the ones you don't see coming.
    • ^
    • v
    The worst part of this isn't the iPod killer talk. I don't expect companies to come up with, "We're gonna be the best also-ran in the MP3 business."

    However, I do expect something more than, "We're gonna run lots of adds and produce two new devices every other week."

    I mean, let's be realistic. Part of the appeal of an iPod is that you know you're gonna have it awhile and it's never gonna be out to pasture. My 3rd gen iPod still works, as does my wife's, and I have a 5th gen I just got because I was so happy with the 3rd.

    Samsung does make nice stuff, but on the higher end. Their consumer-end stuff is average. Not great, not terrible. I will say one thing, though, they do make the best LCD's and televisions I've ever seen. Consistently.

    Beyond that, they come across as a company who just doesn't get it. Flooding a market with more products doesn't exactly create the impression that the ones you put out there are quality.
    • ^
    • v
    I agree with you, Vinny, that the key differentiator for the iPod is iTunes. They offered the iPod for Windows for months before iTunes was available for Windows. When they launched iTunes for Windows, sales of the iPod took off immediately because Windows users previously has sh$tty music applications like Realplayer and Musicmatch (both complete CRAP) as the only option. Nobody will take the market until they improve on the interface of the music application that resides on our computers. You can hype a product all you want, and unless you put out something that people want and can use, it's going to flop.

    As far as Apple only focusing on the attractive factor, I have to disagree. "Attractive" is totally subjective-- some people prefer lots of lights and buttons. They've focused on simplicity and ease-of-use (which has been Apple's thing forever), a market-leading music application, and a music store that kicks ass and keeps getting better. The iPod UI is actually the one thing I think Apple could improve. I get finger cramps scrolling thru my library-- why don't I have the option to scroll through the 26 letters of the alphabet instead of having to scroll through all artists to get to "The Smiths"? I absolutely love my iPod and invested in good headphones to listen to it every day of the week at work. I'm a little peeved that the new FM radio accessory won't work with my iPod photo. :cry:
    • ^
    • v
    I =am= happy with my Archos 4 gig device. Not an iPod, but $100 cheaper than a Nano. I don't buy into the Cult of Apple, though... too many years in publishing with Mac Geeks. :)
 

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