Samsung Embarrassingly Drops the Ball on Tizen
Last June there was a lot of hype surrounding Samsung's coming Tizen OS revolution and how it was gaining steam to usurp Apple's iOS in the mobile space if not Android. In February of this year ABI saw Tizen as a possible weapon that Samsung could use in gaining a foothold in the enterprise market. While that was being claimed, we reported that there was egg on Samsung's face as Docomo dumped the official launch of Tizen OS smartphones at the very last moment. And while there was a tiny glimmer of hope for Tizen OS when Samsung switched their Gear 2 smartwatch from Android to Tizen this past Sunday, it was never meant to be. Sad, considering that it had been hyped by the Android camp for months. Now that it's showtime at Barcelona's Mobile World Congress, Samsung embarrassingly confesses that it's really not on their radar screen for smartphones: Ha! – That's Samsung for you.
According to a new ZDNet Korea report," Samsung Electronics will not release a handset running on the Tizen operating system (OS) anytime soon, the mobile chief of the company said late Sunday.
At a press conference on the sidelines of the Mobile World Congress, JK Shin, co-CEO and head of Samsung Electronics' mobile division stated that "It is too early for a smartphone with Tizen. There are still things that need to be mature (before we launch)."
The biggest obstacle to pushing Tizen is its lack of contents, especially apps. Samsung has been wooing developers into taking interest in the incipient OS but it is dwarfed by competing platforms Android and iOS.
Of course when Samsung had to embarrassingly admit in Barcelona that the hype surrounding their mighty Tizen OS based smartphone was, well, nothing more than empty yapping, they had to say something to make them look like they weren't losing their Midas touch with Wall Street.
So, Samsung's co-CEO boldly claimed that they would dethrone the iPad in 2015. Specifically, Shin stated that "Next year, we will become a leader in tablets." That's the year that Samsung will supposedly launch a foldable display based tablet, which of course could make waves.
Then again, I think it would be best to be a little cautious about claims of grandeur that Samsung makes at trade shows. During their CES 2009 tradeshow, they claimed that they would have a bendable smartphone-like product on the market in two years, as in 2011. We're still waiting for that one.
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