Samsung Galaxy Note II targets Africa
2012-10-19 07:53
Cape Town - Samsung is targeting developing markets with the launch of the Galaxy Note II in Cape Town on Thursday.
"We've already shipped devices to the South African space, and I can tell you now that there are excess of 30 000 that we've already moved into the South African market," Craige Fleischer, director of Mobile Communications at Samsung Electronics South Africa told News24.
There has been anticipation about the launch of the "phablet" in African countries as a larger percentage of users who access the internet, do so by means of a mobile device.
"There is already demand in the market Kenya. Apparently two of the operators and one retails chain is already marshalling stock in the country. Between now and the end of the year - by the end of December - they project they will change the tablet share and will take 10% of the global share," said Robert Ngeru, Samsung commercial director for East and Central Africa.
Build For Africa
The Note II has a 1.6GHz quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM and features a 14cm HD display, but the device is narrower than its successful predecessor.
"Globally, the original Note has sold over 10 million units so it did very well for us. We looked at the demand that this Note II has brought the market and what we've seen is that the demand is three times greater for the Note II upon release, than the original Note," said George Ferreira, vice president and chief operating officer at Samsung Electronics Africa.
Samsung has been pushing its Build For Africa programme, saying that the company produces devices specifically for the continent, given the lack of infrastructure and social problems.
"The Galaxy Pocket: That phone was built for Africa - we did not build that phone for anywhere else in the world. But the demand has been so great also from the rest of the world and especially emerging markets that higher office said we've got to put this product out for the rest of the world and we did that," Ferreira added.
While many parts of Africa are economically depressed, Samsung is focused on the economically active zones to market its products.
"We know that probably the top 20 cities on the African continent contribute probably 80% of the GDP. So we've looked at these cities and Accra is right there. In fact, in the last two months I've been there twice," said Ferreira.
Expansion
The company hopes to continue its expansion beyond the economic hubs on the continent.
"We're addressing these countries with the first tier cities... and now we are asking through our partners, through the operators, through the distributors; through the retail partners, to go and start opening up into the second and third tier cities in the country," added Ferreira.
The Samsung Galaxy Note II has a recommended retail price of around R8 000.
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