Samsung announced its flagship Galaxy S23 smartphone lineup on Wednesday.
Samsung
Samsung on Wednesday launched its latest lineup of flagship Galaxy smartphones, touting a better camera and enhanced gaming features as the South Korean tech giant tries to tempt people to upgrade amid weak macroeconomic conditions and waning consumer demand.
The Galaxy S23 smartphone lineup features three new models: the standard S23, a slightly more expensive S23+ and the top-of-the-line S23 Ultra. The S23 and S23+ start at a price of $799 and $1,000, respectively. The most advanced model will retail at $1,200.
All three are available for pre-order today and will hit the shelves on Feb. 17.
The S23 series will go head-to-head with Apple’s iPhone 14, which launched last September. Samsung typically releases its flagship Galaxy S models in the first half of the year and its Galaxy Z line of folding phones in the second half.
Samsung mostly made subtle improvements to its new premium handset, including improved camera capabilities.
The most expensive of the three models, the Galaxy S23 Ultra, features a 200-megapixel “adaptive pixel” sensor that combines 16 pixels into one larger pixel for brighter, more detailed shots in low light situations, Samsung said.
Samsung added users’ low-light photography with the device would be assisted by much faster processing speeds from its internal chipset, which was developed in partnership with Qualcomm, as well as artificial intelligence.
There’s also a video feature on the device called “astro hyperlapse” which lets users take time-lapsed motion shots — for example, of star movements — without any special equipment.
Samsung also touted the gaming capabilities of its new device, saying users will be able to play for longer thanks to a more powerful battery. The S23 Ultra houses a huge 5,000 mAh, or milliampere hour, battery.
The S23 Plus and S23 come with 4,700 mAh and 3,900 mAh batteries, respectively.
The company also unveiled its new Galaxy Book3 laptop lineup Wednesday, which includes a third Ultra model with a 16-inch AMOLED display. Samsung’s Galaxy Book2 came in only two options. Samsung hopes the new laptops will make a splash in the premium PC market.
The Samsung Galaxy Book3 series.
Samsung
The firm showed off software that lets users drag and drop files between its laptops and smartphones. Users can also pair the Book3 with Samsung tablets to use the latter as a second screen, Samsung said.
Tough times for smartphone market
The company is launching its new products at a particularly tough time for the consumer tech space. Demand for premium smartphones in particular has softened, with people opting to spend less on big-ticket gadgets due to climbing price pressures and tighter budgets.
Global smartphone shipments plunged 18.3% to 300.3 million units in the fourth quarter of 2022 — usually a big holiday shopping period — marking the largest decline in a single quarter on record, according to market research firm IDC.
A total of 1.21 billion smartphones were shipped in 2022, which represents the lowest annual shipment total since 2013, IDC said.
“Everything is heading in the wrong direction for consumer electronic providers,” Paolo Pescatore from PP Foresight told CNBC via email.
On Tuesday, Samsung recorded its worst quarterly profit since the third quarter of 2014. The firm reported operating profit of 4.31 trillion won ($3.4 billion), down 69% from the same period a year ago. Samsung said its performance was hampered by weak demand for mid- to low-end smartphones and memory chips.
Meantime, many people are also suffering from smartphone fatigue whereby, not quite satisfied with improvements promised by newer models, they’re holding onto their current phones for longer.
“As has been the case with most flagship launches in recent years, the customers who will feel the most benefit from Samsung’s latest devices will be those upgrading from older models or from a mid-range device,” said Leo Gebbie, principal analyst for connected devices at CCS Insight.
“Customers who have bought a premium-tier mobile in the last year or two will see little difference between the device they already have and the new Galaxy S23 family.”
In that context, Samsung has consolidated its smartphone portfolio to simplify its offering to customers. The firm incorporated its S Pen stylus into last year’s Galaxy S22, marking the symbolic end of its high-end Note phone series.
It’s also tried to boost consumer appetite for new premium phones with its folding devices. Samsung last year launched two new foldable models, the Galaxy Z Flip 4 and Galaxy Z Fold 4.
Altimeter Capital CEO Brad Gerstner said Thursday that he’s moving out of the “bomb shelter” with Nvidia and into a position of safety, expecting that the chipmaker is positioned to withstand President Donald Trump’s widespread tariffs.
“The growth and the demand for GPUs is off the charts,” he told CNBC’s “Fast Money Halftime Report,” referring to Nvidia’s graphics processing units that are powering the artificial intelligence boom. He said investors just need to listen to commentary from OpenAI, Google and Elon Musk.
President Trump announced an expansive and aggressive “reciprocal tariff” policy in a ceremony at the White House on Wednesday. The plan established a 10% baseline tariff, though many countries like China, Vietnam and Taiwan are subject to steeper rates. The announcement sent stocks tumbling on Thursday, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq down more than 5%, headed for its worst day since 2022.
The big reason Nvidia may be better positioned to withstand Trump’s tariff hikes is because semiconductors are on the list of exceptions, which Gerstner called a “wise exception” due to the importance of AI.
Nvidia’s business has exploded since the release of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in 2022, and annual revenue has more than doubled in each of the past two fiscal years. After a massive rally, Nvidia’s stock price has dropped by more than 20% this year and was down almost 7% on Thursday.
Gerstner is concerned about the potential of a recession due to the tariffs, but is relatively bullish on Nvidia, and said the “negative impact from tariffs will be much less than in other areas.”
He said it’s key for the U.S. to stay competitive in AI. And while the company’s chips are designed domestically, they’re manufactured in Taiwan “because they can’t be fabricated in the U.S.” Higher tariffs would punish companies like Meta and Microsoft, he said.
“We’re in a global race in AI,” Gerstner said. “We can’t hamper our ability to win that race.”
YouTube on Thursday announced new video creation tools for Shorts, its short-form video feed that competes against TikTok.
The features come at a time when TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, is at risk of an effective ban in the U.S. if it’s not sold to an American owner by April 5.
Among the new tools is an updated video editor that allows creators to make precise adjustments and edits, a feature that automatically syncs video cuts to the beat of a song and AI stickers.
The creator tools will become available later this spring, said YouTube, which is owned by Google.
Along with the new features, YouTube last week said it was changing the way view counts are tabulated on Shorts. Under the new guidelines, Shorts views will count the number of times the video is played or replayed with no minimum watch time requirement.
Previously, views were only counted if a video was played for a certain number of seconds. This new tabulation method is similar to how views are counted on TikTok and Meta’s Reels, and will likely inflate view counts.
“We got this feedback from creators that this is what they wanted. It’s a way for them to better understand when their Shorts have been seen,” YouTube Chief Product Officer Johanna Voolich said in a YouTube video. “It’s useful for creators who post across multiple platforms.”
CEO of Meta and Facebook Mark Zuckerberg, Lauren Sanchez, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk attend the inauguration ceremony before Donald Trump is sworn in as the 47th U.S. president in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda in Washington, Jan. 20, 2025.
Saul Loeb | Via Reuters
Technology stocks plummeted Thursday after President Donald Trump’s new tariff policies sparked widespread market panic.
Apple led the declines among the so-called “Magnificent Seven” group, dropping nearly 9%. The iPhone maker makes its devices in China and other Asian countries. The stock is on pace for its steepest drop since 2020.
Other megacaps also felt the pressure. Meta Platforms and Amazon fell more than 7% each, while Nvidia and Tesla slumped more than 5%. Nvidia builds its new chips in Taiwan and relies on Mexico for assembling its artificial intelligence systems. Microsoft and Alphabet both fell about 2%.
The drop in technology stocks came amid a broader market selloff spurred by fears of a global trade war after Trump unveiled a blanket 10% tariff on all imported goods and a range of higher duties targeting specific countries after the bell Wednesday. He said the new tariffs would be a “declaration of economic independence” for the U.S.
Companies and countries worldwide have already begun responding to the wide-sweeping policy, which included a 34% tariff on China stacked on a previous 20% tax, a 46% duty on Vietnam and a 20% levy on imports from the European Union.
China’s Ministry of Commerce urged the U.S. to “immediately cancel” the unilateral tariff measures and said it would take “resolute counter-measures.”
The tariffs come on the heels of a rough quarter for the tech-heavy Nasdaq and the worst period for the index since 2022. Stocks across the board have come under pressure over concerns of a weakening U.S. economy. The Nasdaq Composite dropped nearly 5% on Thursday, bringing its year-to-date loss to 13%.
Trump applauded some megacap technology companies for investing money into the U.S. during his speech, calling attention to Apple’s plan to spend $500 billion over the next four years.