iPhone versus Androids: Round 2, Korea

Once reaching up to 8000 mobile subscribers in one day in Korea, iPhone no doubt still maintains popularity since its late launch here in November 2009. Some of you may not be aware of that there was a round 1 of iPhone versus Androids, perhaps because the earlier attempts to put domestic android phones, such as Motorola ‘Motoroid’ and LGT ‘Android-1’, up against the iPhone in February this year had been somewhat futile.

However, since SKT’s launched its three (more competitive) Android phones in April, there has been a huge come back for Androids, expanding its smartphone market share by six fold up to 35.3% in Korea. In fact, Android phones have actually surpassed the market share of iPhone in Korea which had been reduced from 43.3% in the first quarter to 31.4%. This shift towards the favor of Androids had gradually began with SKT’s launch of Pantech’s ‘Sirius’ mid April, then Samsung’s ‘Galaxy A’, and in May with HTC’s ‘Desire’.

The Android phones still have several matters to settle in order to continue on its successful launch in Korea throughout the latter half of the year, such as the build-in memory for apps, OS upgrades, and payment issues for the Android Market.

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Furthermore, the round 2 of Android vs. iPhone is getting hot with Samsung’s masterpiece ‘Galaxy S’ which held its launching event yesterday, on June 8thin Korea, on the exact same date as the launching of iPhone 4G in the United States.
With the immense upgraded iPhone 4G and Galaxy S launch going eye to eye in Korea, it certainly will not be too easy to determine which one will fully capture the taste of the Korean consumers.

Left: Steve Jobs with iPhone 4G        Right: Samsung’s Galaxy S

Galaxy S has been equipped with a 1 ㎓ processor and the 2.1 version of the Android OS. The data processing speed has been upgraded and it boasts its AMOLED (active matrix organic light-emitting diode) vivid picture display. It is also the thinnest smartphone in the market today with a thickness of 9.9㎜, and has a replaceable battery. No doubt, Galaxy S contains the technology and specifications that could definitely make it possibly one of the world’s best.

The new iPhone 4G, on the other hand, is about one quarter the thickness and approximately two times the picture quality of the iPhone 3GS. It also fully addressed the consumer complaints for the previous iPhone 3GS, by installing a 500-megapixel camera that can capture HD videos and make video calls. It also has many of the iPad features such as an ‘A4′ processor (CPU), 512MB memory, 16 or 32GB capacity, electronic book (eBook) services, and further added multitasking capabilities. These improvements have certainly captured the attention of consumers, and very likely to further the iPhone’s dominance of the global smartphone market.

Galaxy S will be in full release, soon available for Korean consumer around mid-June, while iPhone 4G is scheduled to release in Korea by July – a pleasant surprise as Korea had been 2 years late in getting the first iPhones into Korea. We will simply have to wait and see who will be the ultimate smartphone standing in Korea.