Samsung Galaxy Fold with its foldable screen was the most exciting phone of 2019. And despite its high-price, over 400,000 units of the Fold have been sold, hinting that the future is bright for the Galaxy Fold 2 that is expected this year.
HIGHLIGHTS
- After a lot of speculation, Samsung is out with official figures: Over 400,000 units of Galaxy Fold have been sold.
- The Galaxy Fold became available around mid-2019. It comes with a futuristic foldable display.
- In India, the Galaxy Fold has been launched at a price of Rs 1,64,990.
Finally, there is an official figures. After weeks of speculation that saw numbers like one million, half a million and others thrown around, Samsung has revealed the sales figure for the Galaxy Fold, the company’s first phone with a foldable display. Samsung mobile business chief, Koh Dong-jin, at CES revealed that the company sold between 400,000 to 500,000 Galaxy Fold phones in 2019. While this may not seem very impressive when compared to the sale figures managed by devices such as the Galaxy S10 or the iPhone 11, for a phone that is unique and first with usable with foldable screen, and for a phone that is extremely pricey, these are good numbers.
In India, the Galaxy Fold was launched in the last months of 2019, at a price of Rs 164,999. It is important to note that the Galaxy Fold is a first-generation with entirely new technologies and a unique. When Samsung first launched it, the Galaxy Fold ran into issues related to its foldable screen, and Samsung had to put on hold its mass availability. The device was then re-designed and re-engineered, and then relaunched.
Given this context, the sales figures of Galaxy Fold look very good, and hint at a bright future for the Galaxy Fold 2. For now, there is no clarity on what sort of design the Galaxy Fold 2 will bring or what sort of hardware will be inside it, but rumours suggest that the Galaxy Fold 2 may also launch with last year’s Snapdragon 855 processor, and that it will be considerably cheaper compared to the original price of the Galaxy Fold.
It has been rumoured that for its next foldable phone, or phones, Samsung is exploring several different designs. While some of them are similar to the design of the Galaxy Fold, which opens like a book, some other devices are experimenting with flip-phone design, something that Motorola has used in its new foldable Moto Razr phone. The new Moto Razr is also expected to launch in India this year.
In terms of hardware, the Galaxy Fold 2 is likely to have the hardware similar to what will come in the Galaxy S11, which is going to be launched on February 11 in San Francisco. Similar strategy was used by Samsung in 2019 for the Galaxy Fold, where we saw that the device had the same camera hardware and similar storage that was in the Galaxy S10. The battery configuration, the display technology (of course) and amount of RAM, which was higher in the Galaxy Fold, were different.
