LG looking to shut down phone business instead of selling it, report says
It follows reports earlier this year the company is looking to offload its phone business and its upcoming rollable phone.
- I've been covering technology and mobile for 12 years, first as a telecommunications reporter and assistant editor at ZDNet in Australia, then as CNET's West Coast head of breaking news, and now in the Thought Leadership team.
The LG Rollable was unveiled at CES 2021.
LG is looking to shut down its mobile phone arm, Korean news site DongA reported over the weekend. The business would be shuttered instead of being sold off, the report said, citing an unnamed source, who said negotiations of a sale to Volkswagen and Vingroup JSC have stalled.
That follows a report in January from The Korea Herald that LG was looking to scrap its phone business despite having just premiered its new rollable phone tech at CES 2021.
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LG in February denied reports it was canning its new rollable phone, the LG Rollable, but DongA reported Sunday that LG has canceled its plan to launch rollable phones in the first half of 2021. The hugely competitive global smartphone business is being led by Samsung, Xiaomi, Apple, Oppo and Huawei, with multiple foldable phones on the market and Apple reportedly working on one.
LG is "exploring a variety of options in light of the headwinds facing our mobile business," Michelle Leff Mermelstein, LG's head of US Public Relations, said in an emailed statement.
