[New York Diary] "Can Samsung's AI Phone Beat the iPhone?"

Delivering Stories from Everyday Life in the U.S. Straight from New York

On the night of the 17th (local time), when Samsung Electronics' Galaxy Unpacked event took place, advertisements for the Galaxy S24 series featuring artificial intelligence (AI) technology were displayed in Times Square, Manhattan, New York, USA.

“Can Samsung’s AI phone beat the iPhone?” This was the headline of an article published by the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) immediately after Samsung Electronics unveiled its ‘Galaxy S24’ series equipped with artificial intelligence (AI) technologies such as real-time translation. Local U.S. media expressed expectations that the Galaxy S24 series would usher in the era of 'AI universal smartphones' while also focusing on the competitive landscape between the country’s flagship companies, Apple and Samsung Electronics. Coincidentally, the unpacking event took place the day after painful data was released showing that Samsung had lost its global smartphone sales crown to Apple.

Until now, a sense of crisis surrounding Samsung Electronics has been continuously confirmed in the market. The company has been posting significant losses in its core semiconductor business, and there have been harsh criticisms that it missed the opportunity to dominate the high-bandwidth memory (HBM) sector, which is essential for semiconductor operation. On top of that, the mobile division has also been underwhelming. While Samsung has failed to catch up with Apple’s iPhone in the premium phone competition, it has also seen its low-end market share eroded by Chinese brands such as Xiaomi, Huawei, and Oppo.

In this context, the new Samsung Galaxy S24 series, which emphasizes AI features, is nothing short of a ‘bold move.’ So far, the response from global markets, including the U.S., has been enthusiastic. CNN reported that it would "open the next era of smartphones." The financial media CNBC described it as "a product that signals the beginning of AI universalization in smartphones." There is a flood of evaluations suggesting that Samsung’s first AI phone could become a ‘game changer’ in the future smartphone market. Even if Apple equips its next iPhone with numerous AI features, Samsung, having opened the door to the ‘AI smartphone era’ first, can hold a favorable position in market preemption for more than nine months.

The reason why a photo seemingly showing Apple CEO Tim Cook attending the Galaxy unpacking event became a hot topic on online communities and social networking services (SNS) right after the unpacking is not unrelated to these circumstances. Of course, considering Cook’s neckline and the unnatural photo composition, the image is likely ‘photoshopped.’ With Apple’s iPhone 16 expected to feature AI functions in the second half of this year, the photo satirizes Cook as if he came to ‘spectate in enemy territory,’ highlighting that Samsung is already taking the lead in market preemption.

On the 18th (local time), the day after the Samsung Galaxy Unpacked event, a visitor at the Galaxy Experience Space located in Manhattan, New York, is exploring the real-time translation artificial intelligence (AI) feature applied to the Galaxy S24 series.

On the 18th (local time), the day after the Samsung Galaxy Unpacked event, visitors at the Galaxy Experience Space located in Manhattan, New York, are exploring the features of the Galaxy S24 series.

On the day of the unpacking, advertisements for the Galaxy S24 series, featuring the phrase ‘Galaxy AI is coming,’ covered major landmarks across the U.S., including New York’s Times Square. The next day, at the Galaxy Experience Space in Manhattan, New York, which I visited in person, there was a steady stream of visitors eager to check out the AI phone firsthand. Among locals exploring features such as ‘Circle to Search,’ which allows image searches simply by drawing a circle on a photo, and real-time translation calls, cheers of “Amazing” and “Useful” were heard. An employee in charge of explaining the AI features said, “More visitors came to see the smartphone on the day before, the unpacking day,” and added, “Customer reactions are really positive.”

Samsung Electronics’ unveiling of the AI phone is especially welcome as a ‘first mover’ initiative that creates a new market ahead of others. However, the process of securing a solid market dominance beyond this first step still remains. The WSJ article begins with the sentence, “An AI phone with functions beyond the iPhone has finally been released.” And it ends like this: “Siri (Apple iPhone’s voice assistant), are you listening?”