South Korea's No. 2 tech giant LG Electronics Inc. said Tuesday it will roll out its next flagship smartphone across the world later this month, heralding a possible showdown with the latest model by market leader Samsung Electronics Co.

The G4 smartphone will be launched on April 29 in South Korea, the United States, Britain, France, Singapore and Turkey, according to LG.

Amid the outlook that the G4 will take on metal-framed Samsung Electronics Co.'s Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge that will hit the market on April 10, LG's invitation depicted a leather background, indicating the new flagship smartphone may come with a new design touch that compares with other high-end rivals.

Industry sources also said the G4 is expected to come with a Quad HD display in the 5-inch range like its predecessor, the G3, but with a curved touch.

Analysts said the G4 may become a game-changer for LG, especially as the growth of Chinese firms, which has been cited as a major drag on South Korean players, started to slow.

In 2014, LG Electronics saw its global smartphone share edge up 0.2 percentage point on-year to reach 4.3 percent to stand in the third spot in terms of revenue, market data showed. LG was followed by China's Huawei and Japan's Sony Corp. at 3.8 percent and 3.7 percent, respectively.

Samsung took up 25.1 percent of the global smartphone revenue, hovering far below Apple's 37.6 percent, over the cited period, the data compiled by Strategy Analytics showed. (Yonhap)