Samsung shares plunges by 8 percent over Galaxy Note 7 explosion reports
Close on the heels of USA carrier AT&T announcing that it was dropping the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 from its offerings, as well as stopping the offering of replacements for the handset, T-Mobile has confirmed that it will also be “temporarily suspending” the sales and replacement of the smartphone.
Samsung said it would halt production of the Note 7 after several reports said that the phones would suddenly catch fire. Now, the electronic company has temporarily halted all production of the phones, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported. The Wall Street Journal also said production and sales were being discontinued.
According to a report on The Verge, five replacement Galaxy Note 7 phones have caught fire in the US. Meanwhile authorities in South Korea said they had found a new product defect in the Note 7, but did not identify the issue.
Samsung could face a loss of about $17bn (£13.8bn), as the company chose to end the production and sales of the Galaxy Note 7 permanently.
Damage control must be the words on the minds of everyone working at Samsung, as the company recently announced that it permanently stopped production and sales of its latest flagship, the Galaxy Note 7.
It took Samsung over a week to announce a “voluntary global recall” with Samsung promising to have replacement Note 7’s available by September 21.
The company previously noted that more than one million replacement devices were in use worldwide. Despite their efforts, there have been cases where even the replacement devices exploded.
“I think the cleanest thing to do is to give up on the Note 7”, said HDC Asset Management fund manager Park Jung-hoon, whose fund owns Samsung shares.
He added he’s kept a close watch on his original Galaxy Note 7 since getting it through his employer in August and has experienced no overheating issues.
Samsung will begin exchanging Note 7 phones for other Samsung products, or a refund, on Thursday.
Concerns have also been raised about “contagion” to other Samsung phones which use the same or similar parts, though no instances have been discovered so far.