Newsletter 
Samsung has been walking on eggshells lately between the infamous exploding Galaxy Note 7 and a corruption scandal in its home country, but data from marketing firm Fluent shows that Samsung fans and smartphone enthusiasts are mostly taking it all in stride, which should mean that the big Samsung Unpacked event and its aftermath won’t be affected too much. Essentially, their data shows that the Galaxy Note 7 incident didn’t hurt Samsung’s reputation nearly as much as anybody thought, Samsung owners tend to upgrade within a year or so, and over half of them are apt to buy another Samsung device when they finally decide to upgrade.
To put all of the data to numbers, 63% of Samsung phone owners out there said that the Galaxy Note 7 saga had no bearing on their perception of their favorite smartphone brand, and only 18% of those surveyed said that they had concerns about the Galaxy S8’s safety. 46% of former Galaxy Note 7 owners said that the whole experience didn’t turn them off to Samsung, and 52% of that crowd believe that Samsung will come out of the incident with their reputation unscathed in the end. About 26% of Samsung device owners surveyed said that they were apt to upgrade their devices on a yearly basis. 58% of surveyed Samsung owners said that they would be sticking with their OEM of choice, though their loyalty was eclipsed by iPhone buyers, 89% of whom said that they were sticking with Apple next time they upgraded.
On the hype side of things, about 18% of those surveyed said that they were excited to see Samsung announce new devices. The iPhone crowd beat them again here, with 30% saying that they were hyped to see the next big thing from Cupertino. Finally, touching on the Galaxy S8’s shift to Bixby from Google Now and Google Assistant, 23% of consumers out there say that the AI assistant present in a smartphone actually influences their purchasing decisions. 47% of consumers surveyed use such an assistant, but it appears relatively few of them care which one, which could be good news for Samsung, since Bixby is the new kid on the block, charged with penetrating the established user bases of Cortana and Google Assistant.