The Galaxy Note 7, Samsung’s latest and greatest flagship phablet, boasts a beautiful design, top of the line hardware specifications, and a range of new useful features. Unfortunately, it has one big problem, at least on some units. Some customers have reported that the device’s battery has exploded during charging, which presents a huge safety issue to Galaxy Note 7 owners. Fortunately, Samsung has issued a recall on over two million Galaxy Note 7 units that may be affected. But going forward, they will have to regain the trust of consumers, who may be weary of buying Samsung devices in the future due to safety concerns.
To address the issue directly, Samsung will no longer use batteries made by Samsung SDI in the Galaxy Note 7. Currently, Samsung SDI batteries account for the batteries in about 70% of the Galaxy Note 7 units that have been produced, with ATL making up the other 30%. With the decision to stop using Samsung SDI batteries, the company will likely shift all battery production to ATL, at least until a long-term solution is reached. Samsung SDI partnered with Samsung to make removable batteries for last year’s Galaxy S6 devices, although they only ended up making batteries for a small portion of units shipped due to fierce competition from other hardware vendors like LG Chem and ATL. This time around, devices with Samsung SDI batteries made up the majority of the units produced, however, Samsung’s decision to stop using them in Galaxy Note 7 units will certainly hurt Samsung SDI’s bottom line. Their stock price dropped 2.76 percent after news that their batteries will no longer be used in Galaxy Note 7 devices, and their operating loss is estimated at around 18 billion won ($16 million).
It can be quite unexpected and frightening when devices present severe safety issues, especially when they are otherwise fantastic devices all around. Fortunately for Galaxy Note 7 owners, Samsung has addressed the issue quickly by issuing a global recall of possibly defective units, and they are also now taking steps to ensure that the defective batteries are no longer used while looking into the issues that may have caused the batteries to explode. It is always a good idea to put safety first, so if you think you may own one of the units affected by a potentially faulty battery, it would be wise to take it to a local retailer and see if it needs to be swapped out.