The presentation titled ‘2011 Summary and Lessons Learned/ 2012 Business Forecast’ made it quite evident to Samsung managers that beating Apple was number 1 priority for 2012. The memo reads ‘everything must be in context of beating Apple’.
The documents show thought process, advertising and marketing tactics used by Samsung. They also inform Samsung expected iPhone 5 to release in summer 2012 with cloud integration, CE integration, improved Siri, social networking and LTE. And Samsung also predicted the handset would sell less than 40 million units, but Apple ended up selling 150 million in fiscal 2013.
To curb the threat, Samsung invested on advertising and investment branding for its Galaxy handsets, taking consumers away from Apple stores.
The slide says ‘Customers walk into stores asking for Samsung’. ‘Understand why consumers buy Apple and develop countermeasures by carrier/retailer’.
Samsung also created some campaigns such as ‘The Next Big Thing’ and ‘It Doesn’t Take a Genius’ to lure consumers away from Apple to Samsung. Samsung also requested carrier support for 20 percent of the roadmap, and the rest 80 percent to support carrier initiatives. Basically what the company did was to create devices to carrier’s liking – entry tier low cost phones, joint projects and so on.
Apple on the other hand is difficult to work and the only smartphone maker that can deny carriers and own the user experience.
Apple’s sales projections and internal research show that the company wasn’t aware that it was missing what early adopters of iPhone 5 wanted most, a budget-$300 iPhone with a bigger screen. Apple is reported to release two large-screen iPhones this year to carter growth.
If this is real, I would love to work with them. I can’t even imagine how the meetings go.
“listen here you maggots we need to beat Apple, end of story.”
So what do you think ?
