Samsung is still in very good shape, especially when compared with rival Android vendors, but that doesn’t mean the company has no reason to be feeling nervous right now. The biggest thing that Samsung has to fear right now isn’t Apple but a host of up-and-coming Android vendors that are cranking out dirt-cheap phones with remarkably strong specifications.
If you want to get an idea of just how dire this situation could be for Samsung and other high-end vendors, look no further than the following quote from Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Thursday.
“I would say China is the most competitive market in the world,” he said. “There are so many local players, and some of them are not logical in how they do business. They don’t want to make money in the short term. We definitely don’t want to lose our leadership position in China, and we must balance growth in market share with profitability.”
And this is really the biggest danger to Samsung and any Android vendor right now: There is always some hungry young manufacturer that will essentially kamikaze their bottom line for the sake of winning market share. This is obviously great news for consumers, although big-name Android vendors certainly must be wondering how they’ll ever break even in the future if this sort of cutthroat competition keeps up.