Salving customer pain with new features
Samsung sees a future in which consumer electronics will be more connected and provide a seamless connected consumer experience across devices at home. Investing in that vision, Samsung last week announced its “multi-device experience” strategy, launching a new ranges of products at the Samsung Southeast Asia and Oceania Forum held in Rome, Italy.
The new collection of flagship consumer electronics products are aimed at simplifying the everyday lives of consumers and to address consumer needs in the emerging “smart home” environment.
At the forum, Samsung demonstrated its newest TV product, the 8K QLED TV with an 88-inch screen. The company said it believed that TV will become a dashboard for the user’s Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem, enabling them to manage connected devices from the largest screen in their homes as well as seamlessly sync multiple devices to easily share content and notifications.
Next is the new generation “Family Hub” refrigerator, which comes with a wide range of smart features, including syncing food storage with meal preparation, keeping family members better connected and organised and providing enhanced entertainment. It also supports “Bixby” voice control and can be integrated with Samsung’s “SmartThings” IoT ecosystem.
Users can control and monitor their connected home from the Family Hub screen. With the “View Inside” app,
users can see the contents of their fridge and easily add items to their shopping list or tag items with reminders and expiration dates.
Users can better manage food inside the refrigerator. With the “Meal Planner” feature, the fridge will recommend a meal menu to users based on food preferences, dietary restrictions, and food expiration dates.
“QuickDrive” was another new technology launched at the forum. Installed in Samsung washing machines, it can help reduce the time required for a load of laundry by half, from an hour to about 39 minutes.
QuickDrive technology comes
pre-installed in the WW7800M washing machine, through a “Q-Drum” consisting of a large main drum and a plate in the black that rotates independently.
The machine moves clothes from top to bottom in the drum, while the plate in back introduces a back-and-forth movement. The combination creates a dynamic action powered by double forces that quickly removes dirt to deliver an intense and complete wash cycle.
QuickDrive offers a range of smart and convenient features. An Internet of Things (IoT)-ready and artificial intelligent (AI)-powered laundry assistant called “Q-rator” provides three smart features – laundry planner, laundry recipe, and home care
wizard.
Wanna Swuddigul, vice president, corporate marketing group, said the company’s multi-device experience strategy, “One Samsung Vision”, focuses marketing on customers rather than products. They look at how consumers get the most benefits from Samsung consumer electronics and how products (and what products) can address customers’ painpoints.
The One Samsung policy is also driven by Internet of Things and AI technologies that aim to provide customers with seamless experiences on multiple devices at home – including large screen TVs, refrigerators, air conditioners, washing machines and vacuums.
“We create products with two factors – customers’ painpoints and trends. For example, the washing machine’s “AddWash” feature and the air conditioner’s “Wind-Free” feature were developed to address customers’ painpoints, while 8K QLED TV and the new generation of Family Hub refrigerator were developed to address the trend,” said Wanna.
She said the flagship products available in Thailand in 2018 include air conditioners with the Wind-Free feature, which was first launched in Thailand last year with a small BTU rating. For this year, it will be available in 18,000 BTU and 24,000 BTU models.
The washing machine with the QuickDrive feature is being launched for the first time in Thailand this year.
As well, the 8K QLED TV will be launched in the Thai market this year. Last year the company had success with the introduction of the 4K QLED TV in the large screen size, 55-inch, 65-inch, and 75-inch. The “The Family Hub refrigerator is a new product and we are waiting for the market feedback. We cannot yet commit to the exact time for launching it,” said Wanna.
Samsung is an innovation company, Wanna said, with product development driven by customer insight and technologies.
“This year, we will continue to maintain our market lead in all categories, including the number one market share in TVs and refrigerators, as well as increase our market share in washing machines and air conditioners where we are in the top three players,” said Wanna.
The company will focus more on new ways of marketing through the use of big data analysis, she added.
