Samsung's new Galaxy Wide phone targets budget-minded buyers
The phone is destined for South Korea for now, with no mention of other markets yet.
The Galaxy Wide is designed for budget-conscious consumers.
Samsung has cooked up a new smartphone, at least for South Korean consumers.
The Galaxy Wide smartphone, launched on Monday, is similar to Samsung's Galaxy On7 with such specs as a 5.5-inch, 1,280x720-pixel display, a 1.2GHz quad-core processor and a 13-megapixel rear camera. And that's no coincidence.
"The Galaxy Wide is a Korean exclusive version of Galaxy On7, and there are not plans to sell the device outside of South Korea," a Samsung spokeswoman said.
There are a few differences between the Galaxy Wide and the On7.
The Galaxy Wide features 2 gigabytes of memory and 16GB of expandable storage, compared with On7's 1.5GB GB of RAM and 8GB of storage. The On7 is a budget-conscious phone sold in China and India, while the Galaxy Wide will be released in Samsung's home base of South Korea. Samsung has not released details about other potential markets. The On7 costs 244,491 won ($210), while the Galaxy Wide is slightly pricier at 319,000 won ($276).
Over the past couple of years, Samsung has been hit by weaker smartphone sales. Strong demand for its latest flagship phone, the Galaxy S7, has helped revive business, but the company still depends on low-cost phones to generate sales in markets such as China and India.
Other Galaxy Wide specs include a 5-megapixel front-facing camera and a 3,000mAh removable lithium-ion battery along with a dose of Android Marshmallow topped off by Samsung's TouchWiz interface.
One twist is that the Galaxy Wide includes a T-DMB chip, which lets you access digital terrestrial broadcasting, a form of TV broadcasting higher in quality than that offered by conventional analog signals.
Update, July 7 at 8:40 a.m. PT: Adds comment from Samsung.