Earlier this month Samsung was preparing for the release of a new smartphone powered by Tizen 3.0, namely the Samsung Z2. Official details about the smartphone’s availability remain shrouded in mystery, but Samsung India recently sent out invitations for the unveiling of a new smartphone, which will take place tomorrow, on August 23rd. The invitation doesn’t mention any particular product, but industry insiders are of the opinion that the event will revolve around the unveiling of the Samsung Z2.
Samsung’s Tizen operating system hasn’t shaped the mobile market in any significant manner so far, and according to HI Investment & Securities analyst Song Eun-jeong “sales figure of Tizen-powered phones in India is currently too small to analyze. It has not yet become mainstream in the nation”. Nevertheless, the Korean tech giant is willing to put more time and effort into its in-house platform, hoping that eventually, it will account for a larger part of the smartphone OS market. Apparently one of the next steps towards this goal is to announce the Samsung Z2 in India tomorrow. The handset is reported to run on the latest version of Tizen, namely Tizen 3.0, and feature a 4-inch or 4.5-inch display, an unspecified quad-core processor, 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of on-board storage, and a 1,500 or 2,000 mAh battery. The Samsung Z2 will apparently cost around $70, and the company is expected to introduce the Samsung Z2 in more markets aside from India, including Bangladesh, Indonesia, Kenya, Nigeria, Nepal, South Africa, and Sri Lanka.
As for Tizen OS and its future, Hanyang University Business School professor, Han Sang-lin, cited by The Korea Herald, says that although Tizen-powered smartphones are not viewed too positively by consumers, “Samsung is expected to continue unveiling them in low-end markets to expand its budget smartphone sales and to strengthen its own operating system”. This leads us to another Tizen-powered smartphone that was recently discovered in Zauba’s database – the SM-Z930F – which will likely hit the market bearing the Samsung Z9 moniker and more powerful internal hardware. The Samsung Z9 could theoretically prove that Tizen OS can survive and compete in other market segments beyond the entry level, but chances of it being unveiled tomorrow during the event in India are slim.