Dive Brief:
- Musician Chris Kiley posted pictures of himself on Facebook in a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 costume, complete with smoke.
- Galaxy Note 7’s potential to catch fire or explode resulted in a recall in August and a public relations nightmare that is still unfolding.
- Most recently, Samsung officially canceled the product.
Dive Insight:
Here’s a perfect example of the damage that can occur when a company doesn’t get a product right. The Halloween costume may be funny to most, but the gaffe is costing Samsung big-time. While the company has not yet released its latest revenue figures, early speculations estimate Samsung lost a minimum of $2.3 billion in revenue due to the failure, and the fallout may continue well into the future.
The Galaxy Note 7 was expected to make a splash in the enterprise market as perhaps the leading premium non-Apple smartphone. Those days are now over, and there are a lot of product boxes sitting around, so this effort seems almost inevitable. For Samsung, the question is whether its next high-end smartphone will restore buyer confidence -- or become another Halloween costume.
