“The rumor of Apple’s new iPhone 5S being made available in a light Champagne Gold color only surfaced in the last few weeks,” Jack Purcher reports for Patently Apple. “As the rumors began to slowly turn into credible news, Samsung executives went into emergency meetings. The end result was an official statement made yesterday that they’ve decided to build a line for producing metal cases, e.g. magnesium and aluminum, in Gumi plant by the end of this year. The Korean report provided a photo of a metal case suggesting that Samsung will likely offer their future metal backed Galaxy smartphone in Gold.”
“According a new Korean report, the Wireless Business Division of Samsung Electronics decided on August 29 to build a line for producing metal cases, e.g. magnesium and aluminum, in Gumi plant by the end of this year,” Purcher reports. “The report states that Samsung is trying to reinforce a premium brand image by enhancing the design competitiveness. At present, their plastic casing gives the Galaxy smartphone line-up a very cheap consumer experience in contrast to Apple’s classy glass finish for the iPhone 5.”
Purcher reports, “According to the report, “The purpose of this move is to apply metal cases to their premium smartphone models to be released early next year. The report added that ‘”only Apple has used metal cases. The late Steve Jobs, Apple founder, insisted on metal to emphasize the futuristic feeling of the iPhone and iPad series.'”
Read more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Fire up the Xerox machines Samsung! That is all you know what to do. Shame on you!
> premium smartphone models to be released early next year.
Premium? It doesn’t matter if the case looks more “premium,” because it still runs Android.
I was in my local Staple’s yesterday and they have a whole aisle of items for the iPad and iPhone. At the end I saw what appeared to be a MacBook Air, but on closer examination it was a Samsung rip-off version. I had the urge to smash it to smithereens.
Really?
No not really. I just made it up to be dramatic and have something to post so a dumbshit like you could make the comment “Really?”. Have a nice day returd.
I can picture the scurrying. Just like when you drop a peanut butter sandwich beside an anthill.
Samsung employees must have a low self-esteem
Samsung itself must have low self-esteem!
I think this move will Gumi things up for Samsung. Hope they have their antenna strategy worked out.
As for antennas, Samsung will do whatever works in an iPhone. Samsung is good at copying, but useless at innovating.
FYI: its pronounced like “goo m” not gummy. (구미)
Mein freund!
Danke Schon.^^
Not only is their revenue going to fall with the arrival of the 5c but their average profit per phone is going to drop because of the increase in cost of slapping a metal backing to a square mile of real estate to the back of their phablets.
You got that right. (if you mean the Galaxy S5) Those phablets are going to require some large blocks of aluminum to machine out. It takes longer for Apple to mill the smaller iPhone casings than for Samsung to create those huge metal rings around the Galaxy S4. It will also increase the weight by using aluminum although I’ve heard they’re experimenting with magnesium casings. CNC milling is rather time intensive. At least Apple has accumulated plenty of CNC milling machines over the past few years and can spread the cost out over its entire mobile lineup. Samsung might be able to do it but it’s going to cost them dearly. I think it’s really foolish for Samsung to pursue what Apple is doing just for the sake of taking iPhone market share. Apple’s whole business model is different from Samsung’s business model as far as premium products are concerned.
I’d be very surprised if Samsung could shift gears so quickly converting to unibody smartphones and not run into major problems. It seems Samsung would have to give up user replaceable batteries, too, if they use an all metal back. No way they’re going to have a metal door back there. The whole idea seems preposterous but Samsung isn’t the type of company to back down from a fight.
Samsung will not “machine” cases—it will stamp them (and hope no one notices…).
I guarantee they will use the thinest aluminum they can get to just stamp and skin the back side of it.
Stamp, stamp, stamp, the clones are marching…. 🙂
Lots of luck, copy cats
you mean, “rots of ruck”, don’t you?
Now how could that be offensive? People all over the globe mangle English and English speakers laugh at their attempts.
Just like the Spanish, French, Italians and so on laugh at our attempts at their languages.
I happen to be very fluent in Fringlish myself.
Here, Franglais.
Your karmic destiny in the next life will likely be to work in the Korea as a foreigner, as I have done, and to have everyone sneer at your failure to grasp the intricacies of politeness levels in Korean. These can be brutally tough, especially when speaking about a third person, whose relationship with both oneself and one’s interlocutor must be factored into the verb ending. Most foreigners manage to sound like brain-addled children.
Scooby Doo?
Awwww…Assmung is not moving as fast as usual lately.
You cannot be serious. The color or any smartphone is the least important feature. The staff at MDN are smoking some excellent ganja if they think this report has any validity.
I agree. Are we that bored that “gold” is one of the biggest features being talked about?
This is Scamscum we are talking about here. This kind of half-assed copying is right up their alley.
Color is the easiest feature to copy. Color adds nothing to the function and performance of any phone, it’s purely aesthetic; and, if you put your phone in a case, the most irrelevant feature.
It’s all about China.
Samsung knows what this will do in China.
So why didn’t they do it first if they know it?
Because, as with everything they do, they don’t know it until they see Apple do it first.
OK, so let’s assume that Samsung can imitate the champagne colour. How are they going to make the screen look like IOS 7 too ?
The moment it’s switched on, it will show all those icons that were so carefully copied from IOS 1-6. Are they going to rewrite Android too to look like IOS 7 ?
Samsung is the new Microsoft, with 2 exceptions: Samsung fires up the copiers a lot faster than Microsloth and they do a more exact copy (probably because our “fine” government lets them get away with such blatant patent infringement). Microsloth always threw a stupidity twist into their copy.
And they can’t agree on a standard UI or OS to bring all their products together. Good thing Assmung or Google don’t have to have Adobe or high-end video and audio programs running on anything.
Another difference? Samsung would not have bothered to put the close box on the opposite side of the window.
(the new guys here may not get that reference)
True!
Kind of makes you wonder why Apple is moving toward a design that is widely agreed to give a cheaper user experience? With the complete success of the iPod unibody aluminum design, why would Apple even consider pulling back from excellence to cheese?
Some apples and some cheeses go well together, but Apple should never be paired with cheese.
We don’t know what improvements apple made to their manufacturing techniques. Remember the unibody plastic MacBook? That was well received.
For all we know, they could have come up with a way to make the phone waterproof by using a plastic shell…
I didn’t have a unibody plastic MacBook, had the previous version, which had a lot of case-related problems over the years. The last two months under AppleCare, Apple completely replaced the non-unibody case on mine.
But soon after the plastic unibody MacBook was introduced, the entire MacBook line was discontinued. One can only conclude that Apple wasn’t getting enough people to choose the plastic MacBook at $999 over the MacBook Pro at $1,199 to justify keeping the second line.
They also went completely unibody aluminum for the iPod line.
As far as waterproof goes, guess we’ll find out Sept 10. But I will hazard a guess that aluminum is as impervious to water as plastic. It’s the openings that let the water in.
“Widely agreed” by who?
Samsung.
“At present, their plastic casing gives the Galaxy smartphone line-up a very cheap consumer experience in contrast to Apple’s classy glass finish for the iPhone 5”
Can’t set the bar much lower than that.
I see your point. The past business model was for high profit margins. I suppose the new design may still yield a high profit. Also, we don’t know how much revenue sharing that they may get from the providers. perhaps that’s the idea. Or maybe Apple is increasing profit by increasing volume. I guess only Apple knows. I’m due for an upgrade of my 4S, so I’ll probably upgrade and keep it, or trade my daughter for her old 5, so she has bragging rights for the newest model.
Why? Because they’ve got that doofus Tim Cook running things, that’s why…
If Samsung had come out with a champagne colored aluminum bodied phone it would still be an Android phone. If the 5S had a plastic body it would still be an iPhone. The material used in the body of the phones means little if anything to most people. 90% or higher put their phone in a case as soon as they buy it. It’s what’s inside the body of the phone that matters.
“Apple’s rumored champaign gold iPhone 5S sends Samsung execs scurrying”
Roaches have a tendency to do that in the light.
Vivid and aptly metaphorical. The very best advertisers, and headline writers, and poets—and commenters—will choose vivid imagery to scar consciousness. Message not only received, but implanted.
Samsung will come out with a cheap beer color.
You may have a great idea. An aluminum body made from a beer can! It’s niche, but some may love it. I’ll drink to that. Cheers!
Urine, er, your in the right color range.
With the added smell to it. Yuck !
Since Apple fans have been led to believe that the way a product looks is a feature worthy of a patent, I can understand why this would get MDN and it’s minions so upset. You guy’s will be calling the champangne color an innovation and claiming Jony is a Genius for thinking of it. Then of course, you’ll want to patent the chamapgne… and then sue Toyota for making a Camry the same color in 1994.
Get over it guys. Do you like your notifications? Apple ripped that off. Pinch-to-zoom. Nokia did that before Apple even made phones. They just didn’t think to patent it. And it probably should have never been granted a patent anyway.
Spend more time being upset about things that really matter. It’s just a phone.
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
It isn’t just a phone, it’s The iPhone.
A big difference that you don’t understand.
In what phone Nokia had pinch-to-zoom before iPhone was launched. And don’t tell me about some concept video made by Nokia. Making a concept video and actual product are very different things. For example Nokia has been showing concept video of a transparent phones since 2005 but I haven’t seen such a phone yet.
Also have you seen Android it’s a complete rip off of iPhone. Google was designing a blackberry copy but after seeing iPhone completely changed the design.
I have an unlocked iPhone 5. I like it… but it is just a phone.
Sorry, but not just a phone. It is a portable computer, that happens to make phone calls. If all you do is make phone calls with it, you ripped yourself off. I mean that in a nice way.
iPhone 5???? Liar.. or just a victim of Samesung imitation copy
This is exactly why I say Schmidt and screwggle are cut from the exact same cloth as Kun-Lee and the scamscum clowns. Two pieces of sh*t on two different continents.
Exactly how does one pinch to zoom on a resistance single touch screen, Thomas? Since Apple invented the Multi-touch screen and the ONLY prior use of a capacitance single touch screen was the LG Prada, it is not possible for Nokia to have a two-touch pinch, much less pinch-to-zoom on their phones. Ergo, you are making up your claim of Nokia having such a feature before Apple made phones. . . a lie. Notifications? Existed on computers. Not a new technology.
“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”
Samesung copies Apple Mac Mini
Samesung copies Apple Macbook Air
Samesung copies Apple Wallet
Samesung copies iPhone
Samesung copies iPad
Samesung copies Apple packaging
Samesung copies iPad mini slim bezel
Samesung copies iOS icons
Can someone continue??..
I hope Samsung can work out the mag part of it. That stuff burns nicely and add water… WOW! Could use it in a pinch when starting that fire while camping.
Never leaders, always followers! What scum they are.
What makes them scum is not the following, but the pretending otherwise.
This points to a larger issue. Exactly what people define as innovation. Apparently producing a gold(ish) colored phone is so innovative that it causes competitors to scramble and pundits and analysts to swoon. But, coming up with brand new ways of producing displays to reduce thickness and weight while gaining display quality, is not. Nor is developing your own chip technology and writing your own software to take advantage of it, or… While I like the idea of more colors, I remain amused that that will be the headline over the really important innovations, whatever they are.
“Emergency meetings”…over a color…not features, not capability, not a new processor, not longer battery life…but color. Unfreakin’ believable.
Samsung executives = fools.
Tim Cook = genius.
I wonder if there is a VP at Samsung whose title is “Director of Copying Apple Products”.
I have to laugh:
The report states that Samsung is trying to reinforce a premium brand image
Heeheehee! They said “premium“! 😆
by enhancing the design competitiveness
BWAHAHAHAHA! They said ‘competitiveness‘ ! ! !
😆 😆 😆 😆
It is rather amusing, in a queasy kind of way…realising that competition—the driver of the world’s economic engine—is increasingly being replaced by the shortcuts of industrial espionage and the fastening of lamprey-like teeth on every new thing, supported and fomented by medieval patent law, corrupt courts, political patronage and nationalist policies of protectionism. Advertisers lying through their teeth. Watchdog agencies asleep at the wheel. The Department of Justice an infected Cujo. Lurching zombies clutching Samsung phones.
Derek, you have a knack for inspiring the most lurid nightmares…
Lamprey is a wonderful metaphor. Everyone go look up some pictures of lamprey. You’ve seen its mouth in multiple horror movies.
And thank you Hannah for the complement. As I work on perfecting my fiction writing, I try to polish my ability to evoke. Being a bit manic myself, I enjoy expressing extremes both positive and negative. I find a lot of human behavior to be beyond any nightmare I’ve ever had. I find it extremely useful to use subconscious triggers to help people understand what I consider real horror, that being the human ability to believe almost anything to be absolutely ‘true’. It doesn’t get more scary.
And of course, watching capitalism turn into CRAPitalism via today’s self-destructive biznizz world, is just another variation on that theme.
I enjoy encouraging the positive in people, at least when I’m not out to trample trolls. That’s one reason I enjoy supporting Apple’s good works. I also enjoy joining the techy with the creative. 😀
A golden shower of iPhones for the execs at Samsung. Nice…
(….and there’s no “i” in Champagne m’kay?)
“Only Apple has used metal cases”?
HTC One in Silver and Black metal.
Cook should put some fake leads that Apple is building a turd Zune Brown phone with a manual rotary dial then watch Samsung copy it….
I do think that Tim Cook wants to stick it to Samsung because of their blatant IP ripoff, and their misrepresentations. But his first priority is good business. Revenge can come at a later time…
Your idea is a good one. Apple could engineer false leaks to misdirect the competition, preserving first-mover advantage for themselves in an emerging product category; or spinning their adversary off the cliff with an altogether fake product rumour.
Unfortunately, Apples fake ideas might still be better than Samsung own.
I think Apple will just keep their heads on their own game.
interesting to note that the only really successful phone maker profit wise after Apple is Samsung which copies it the most (both together take 90% of phone profits).
BB, Win Phone etc tried to go their own way and they are dead or dying.
shows how right Jobs, Ive, Forstall, Cook got the iPhone
Yes, and I don’t quite understand why more people aren’t saying this. As if the emperor hasn’t any clothing, and his subjects are loath to mention it…?
Proof positive that all that Samdung is dedicated to is attempting to catch up & slavishly copy Apple. Boycott Samdung & crush them like a cockroach.
The word is NOT protected by thebFrenchnin any way except when used with a caplial “C” and referring to an alcoholic brverage called Champagne or name with the word Champagne in it if the grapes (there are only three) are not growni,and the beverage is no made in the actual Champagne area of France.
It has nothing to do with the use of the word referring to the color if something such as a car, cellphone, paint, or anything else unrelated to the Sparkling Wine we know as Champagne. If any vintner creates a light gold or rose-colored liquid that is alcoholic in nature and calls it Champagne or uses the word somewhere in the name, and it is not harvested in and/or vented in the actual, true Champagnes districts of Champagne in France, the he/she should be worried or at least concerned, but, not Apple, at least not in “The Case of the Deadly Champane-Cłolored iPhone 5S.”
I call bs on this report. Samsung is just going to dump a bunch of gold glitter into the next batch of plastic and call it a day.