Samsung is probably alone in the foldable phone race

Samsung is set to host the Galaxy Unpacked 2020 event at 7:30PM IST today. At its upcoming event, the company will be launching the Galaxy Note 20 series smartphones along with the Galaxy Watch 3, Galaxy Tab S7 and the Galaxy Buds Live earphones. In addition to all these devices, Samsung will also be launching the Galaxy Z Fold 2 smartphone.

To give you a quick brief about the company’s upcoming smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2 is tipped to get a 7.7-inch sAMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate on the inside and a 6.23-inch sAMOLED display on the outside. It is likely to be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 865+ chipset that is coupled with 256GB and 512GB storage options. On the camera front, the phone is expected to get 64MP+12MP+12MP camera setup on the outside and a 10MP camera on the inside. It is likely to feature support for 5G connectivity and come with a 4,365mAh battery.

Now, the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2, when it launches would be the company third foldable display smartphone after the Galaxy Fold that was launched last year and the Galaxy Z Flip that was launched alongside the Galaxy S20 series smartphone earlier this year.

Apart from Samsung, the only two companies that are actively pursuing the quest of launching foldable display smartphones are Motorola and Huawei. While Motorola has launched just one foldable display smartphone, that is, the Moto Razr, so far, Huawei has launched two such smartphones. First is the Huawei Mate X that was showcased at MWC 2019 and the smaller Huawei Mate Xs that was launched earlier this year and is yet to be available in a number of major markets across the globe including in India.

The only other company that is testing the waters is LG that launched the G8X ThinQ Dual-Screen smartphone last year. However, one major difference between the LG G8X ThinQ and other foldable smartphones is that LG’s smartphone isn’t exactly a foldable display smartphone. Rather, it is a combination of a phone and a display that are attached together using hinges. The phone can function as a separate unit when the hinges are removed. So you see, LG is not really competing in this market.

Coming back to Samsung, it is the only company that is not just pursuing the goal of launching foldable display smartphones but it is also regularising it simply by the virtue of offering foldable display phones for a variety of users and following it up with successors every year (did you know Galaxy Z Fold 2 is the successor to last year’s Galaxy Fold?) -- something that happens in case of single display smartphones like the ones that we have been using until now. As far as the other companies are concerned, both OnePlus and Xiaomi have shown off concept foldable display smartphones but neither of these companies has launched a commercial product so far.

Samsung, on the other hand, has sold 2,30,000 units of Galaxy Z Flip, a report by the Times of India states. The company hasn’t disclosed the sales figures for the Galaxy Fold. Safe to say that it is marching ahead in this race compared to its successors. That said, it might be the only company that is still running.