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Samsung Tuning Down Orders for Note 20 Components

The Elec reported that Samsung Electronics ordered 20% less components for the Galaxy Note20 compared to its predecessor, based on the miscalculation of demand for the Galaxy S20 series launched earlier this year that sold less than expected.
The Note20 comes in a 6.9-inch screen Ultra version and a 6.7-inch screen standard version. Samsung will build an initial shipment of 3 million units for the latest Note smartphone after sales begins and 10 million units by the end of the year. Samsung took a conservative approach to securing parts for the Note20 Series due to the lackluster sales of the Galaxy S20 series. Samsung expected the S20 series to sell around 35 million units, but actual sales were much less. Only the Galaxy S20 Ultra, the highest tier out of the three models offered in the series, saw high demand but Samsung miscalculated its demand. The Galaxy Note20 Ultra is expected to account for 70% to 80% of sales out of the two Note models. Samsung expects the smaller model to sell well in Europe, where smaller phones are preferred. The cameras of the Note20 Ultra are inferior than the S20 Ultra cameras. Note20 Ultra sports a 108MP wide angle, a 12MP telephoto and a 12MP ultra-wide for cameras on its back. S20 Ultra had a 48MP telephoto camera instead. Note20 Ultra also doesn’t have 3D Time of Flight (ToF) module substituting a laser auto focus sensor. Samsung made the swap to laser as ToF showed problems in focusing. Note20 Ultra also has 5x optical zoom like the S20 Ultra, but digital zoom has been reduced to 50x instead of S20 Ultras 100x. Samsung didn’t push the cameras of the Note20 Ultra.  The rear camera also seems less capable than the S20 Ultra. 6.9-inch Galaxy Note20 Ultra weighs 208g, heavier than the 6.8-inch Galaxy Note10 Plus’s 196g but lighter than 6.9-inch Galaxy S20 Ultra’s 220g. S Pen’s latency for the new Note stands at 9ms. The new phone is also covered in Corning’s latest Gorilla Glass Victus. Last year, the Note10 Plus accounted for 70% of global sales. The Galaxy Note20 Ultra has a 120Hz edge display, a 100MP camera and supports up to 5X optical zoom. The standard Galaxy No20 has a 60Hz display and is not curved at the edges a change from the last few models. A total of 10 million Note series phone ship plus 20 million S20 series shipped, would be 33% less than the peak reached from 2014 to 2017 when 45 million flagship smartphones were shipped per year.
 
The Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra is the first to have Samsung Displays lower display power tech HOP[1] and Corning’s Gorilla Glass Victus. However, the camera is less powerful than the Galaxy S20 Ultra launched earlier this year. Samsung Display has adopted LTPO technology used previously in the Apple Watch for smartphones. The new panel is expected to be welcomed by 5G smartphone users when using video and games that consume much power. The company is using "adaptive frequency" technology for variable scan rates to lower power consumption. It was first applied to the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra. Adaptive frequency automatically adjusts display scan rates from 10 Hz to 120 Hz to minimize power consumption. When users switch from mobile games to still images like photos, this new technology changes the scan rate from 120 Hz to 10 Hz, reducing panel drive power by up to 60 percent. By implementing such low scan rates, Samsung Display reduced panels’ power consumption by up to 22 percent in a daily use environment compared to other smartphone models. Panels account for about 40 percent of all smartphone power consumption. Current smartphone panels that use fixed scan rates, use excess electric power when a low scan rate is acceptable. Samsung Display has implemented a low scan rate of 10Hz for the first time in smartphones by using “LTPO” technology. LPTO reduces power consumption by 15% to 20% vs. LTPS. 


[1] Samsung’s name for LTPO is HOP, which is short for hybrid oxide and polycrystalline silicon