BARCELONA, Spain -- Samsung Electronics will discontinue its phablet Galaxy Note series to make way for the high-end Galaxy S22 Ultra lineup, Samsung’s mobile business head said Monday.

“The Ultra line for S series will fill in the Galaxy Note lineup every year from now on,” Roh Tae-moon, president and head of Mobile eXperience business at Samsung Electronics, told reporters at MWC 2022 during his visit to Samsung’s exhibition. Samsung’s MX business oversees handsets, tablets, personal computers and wearable devices.

This is the first public statement confirming that Samsung has decided to kill the Note series. The world’s largest smartphone manufacturer by sell-in skipped the launch of a new Note lineup, as the Note 20 and Note 20 Ultra was the last to be released in 2020 in its decadelong history.

The latest S22 Ultra, a 14.6-inch smartphone with a built-in stylus support, is drawing keen attention from Note fans worldwide as sales kicked off on Feb. 25. Samsung announced in late February that S22 Ultra drove the record-high presales of the flagship S series smartphones.

The S22 series -- composed of S22, S22 Plus and S22 Ultra -- saw presales in some 70 countries jump more than twofold compared to that of the S21 lineup, and more than 6 out of 10 presales globally went to S22 Ultra, according to Samsung.

The growing popularity of the S22 series is raising anticipation that it would help increase the Korean firm’s market share, although it still has a ways to go before it can close the gap with US rival Apple.

Samsung’s smartphone revenue increased 11 percent to reach $72 billion in 2021 from the previous year, while market leader Apple’s revenue surged 35 percent to $196 billion over the cited period, according to market intelligence firm Counterpoint Research.

Roh told reporters that, along with the popularity of S22 Ultra, Samsung’s smoother multidevice connectivity would be key to narrowing the gap with Apple.

Sunday’s announcement of the Galaxy Book2 lineup just a day before MWC 2022 stated laptop users would be able to access Samsung apps with Galaxy Book Experience, enjoy the same user interface with mobile devices under One UI Book 4 and allow a laptop and a tablet to be controlled with a single mouse and keyboard under Samsung Multi Control.

The introduction of these functions are part of Samsung’s bid to create a more connected Galaxy ecosystem, in hopes of challenging Apple’s own Continuity and Universal Control features.

“We are working to offer users a smoother experience when moving between devices,” Roh said. 

By Son Ji-hyoung
Korea Herald correspondent
(consnow@heraldcorp.com)