Galaxy S3 demand 'far exceeded expectation' says Samsung

Samsung has admitted it was caught off-guard by the popularity of the Samsung Galaxy S3, with shipping delays potentially proving costly for the Korean tech giant.

Samsung faced production issues with its newest quad-core toy, though says component shortages have been sorted out, and the company is now gunning at full-whack in an effort to meet demand for the 4.8-inch smart phone.

"It is simply that demand far exceeded our expectation," a company spokesperson told Reuters. "But that doesn't mean we had set a very conservative demand forecast."

Samsung recently boasted that it's on course to sell a whopping 10 million Galaxy S3 devices by the end of July, a high figure that's only matched by Apple's own sales figures -- the iPad-spawning company managed to flog 37 million iPhones in the last three months of 2011.

I'm sure Samsung is enjoying having a gadget that's so in demand, though Reuters notes that the company -- whose various subsidiaries also build ships and manufacture tanks -- may have lost some easy money thanks to an inability to meet early demand.

One early flaw that stymied UK shoppers was a lack of blue Galaxy S3 models. The "newly invented blue colour and special hyperglaze material" (read: blue paint) seemingly proved tricky to get right, causing a dearth of blue-hued smart phones in the S3's first weeks on sale.

US networks Sprint and AT&T also had to issue delay warnings recently, warning that "overwhelming demand and limited supply" could leave buyers waiting.

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