Samsung CEOs' salaries drop drastically due to poor sales

According to a report out of Korea, tech giant Samsung's CEOs have seen their salaries dropping drastically in 2015, something which the report claims is due to the fact that the company's sales have largely been sluggish this year.
Citing Samsung's regulatory filing, the report reveals that of the three CEOs, Kwon Oh-hyun - who is also the vice chairman - was the highest paid this year with 3.82 billion won ($3.25 million) salary, down from 6.25 billion won he received last year.
Yoo Boo-keun - who is head of the company's consumer electronics business division - received 2.34 billion won, down from 3.61 billion won last year. Mobile business chief Shin Jong-kyun saw the largest drop, receiving just 2.28 billion won this year compared to 12.03 billion won in 2014.
It's worth mentioning that the decrease in overall salaries was due to a drastic drop in incentives, which are usually related to the company's performance.
The revelation comes over a couple of weeks after there were reports that Samsung is planning to lay off managerial-level workers and executives in an effort to cut more costs.

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Samsung is reportedly close to becoming OLED display supplier for future iPhones

A new rumor out of South Korea says that Samsung and Apple are in advanced talks about the former supplying the latter with OLED display panels for future iPhones. A deal hasn't been concluded yet, but apparently that's very close to happening.
As such, the Korean company is looking to increase its OLED panel output in order to be able to meet the bigger demand that it shall face if it becomes Apple's supplier. In fact, Samsung could actually decide to build an entire OLED production facility just to supply Apple, if the deal goes through of course. It's possible that Apple will finance such a move, at least in part.
The first step in Samsung's strategy is already occurring, as it is selling one of its LCD manufacturing facilities' equipment to a Chinese company. The money it will gain from this move will be used only to increase OLED panel production capacity.
And if it builds production lines solely for Apple, Samsung could become the Californian company's biggest supplier of displays, moving past LG Display, certain unnamed sources are speculating. Samsung is already making OLED panels for the Apple Watch, so a deal for iPhones would be an extension of an existing agreement.
Samsung is going to face competition in the OLED screen space from quite a few Chinese companies that have all planned to build production facilities soon, so it can no longer afford not to aggressively invest in its own lines.

Source | Via

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iPad Pro's Lightning port is USB 3.0-compatible, Apple confirms

Less than a week after an iFixit teardown for the iPad Pro revealed a USB 3.0 controller, Apple has confirmed that the tablet's Lightning port is compatible with the new USB standard, something which the company didn't advertise initially.
This means that the iPad Pro will support transfer speeds of up to 5Gbps, which is more than 10 times faster than the USB 2.0's theoretical maximum of 480Mbps.
However, keep in mind that the cable the tablet ships with is a standard USB 2.0 one, which means you'll have to purchase a separate USB 3.0 adapter to take advantage of the feature - sadly, such an adapter doesn't exist yet.

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128GB iPad Pro models ordered now only ship at the end of the month

It looks like Apple managed to somehow underestimate demand for the most expensive versions of its latest tablet, the iPad Pro. This is especially true in the United States, where ordering an iPad Pro with 128GB of storage (either in Wi-Fi-only or 4G LTE-capable iterations) will see you waiting until the end of the month for it to actually be shipped.
The situation is less dire for the 32GB model, which should arrive at your doorstep in 4-5 days, depending on which shipping method you choose (the slower one is free, while the faster one costs $10).


If you want the $949 Wi-Fi-only 128GB iPad Pro or the $1,079 128GB 4G model you need to wait until either November 30 to December 2 (for free shipping) or November 25 to November 30 (if you pay the $10 to expedite things). That's a delay of two to three weeks, so it's no small thing.
Even worse is how long you'll need to wait if you order an Apple Pencil stylus or the Smart Keyboard accessory. Both of these are currently listed by the Apple store as "available to ship" in 4-5 weeks. That's pretty bad if you wanted to use the two essential iPad Pro accessories in Apple's view from the moment you get the tablet.

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Apple Pay arriving tomorrow in Canada

If you live in Canada, you may have been upset that Apple Pay still hasn't launched yet. Be ready to add your cards to those iPhones tomorrow. Though, only if it's an American Express card.
Earlier this month, when users attempted to add a Canadian AMEX card (To an iPhone on a US setting) they received new a message from American Express reading “We are unable to complete your request to add your card”, then, users were asked to “call the number on the back of your card” for assistance.


This new error message hinted that AMEX was likely preparing for Apple Pay support in Canada. Now, customer service representatives have confirmed that American Express is getting ready for Apple Pay to go live in Canada tomorrow, November 17.
Apple had mentioned that American Express was going to lead expansion of Apple Pay beyond the UK and the US, with Canada and Australia to see the service launching by the end of the year while Spain, Singapore, and Hong Kong are to get it in 2016.

Source | Via

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Canaccord: Apple's share of smartphone industry profits now stands at 94%

In Q3 2015, of the total smartphone industry profits, Apple's share stood at a whopping 94%, according to a latest report by market research firm Canaccord Genuity. That's up from 92% last quarter and 85% a year ago.
While Apple's share speaks for itself, what makes it even more remarkable is the fact that the Cupertino-based company's contribution to the smartphone market stood at just 14.5% (48 million units). FYI, the average selling price of iPhones in Q3 this year was $670, which translates into a 37% operating margin.
Samsung, which shipped a total of 81 million smartphone units in Q3 (24.5% of the total units shipped in the quarter), was a distant second with 11% share of the total profits. The average selling price of the South Korean company's phones was just $180 in the quarter.
While the combined profit share of Apple and Samsung exceeds 100%, the net figure comes back to 100% considering the losses reported by other major players - including HTC, BlackBerry, Sony, and Lenovo - in the high-end smartphone segment, the report notes.

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Samsung CEOs' salaries drop drastically due to poor sales

According to a report out of Korea, tech giant Samsung's CEOs have seen their salaries dropping drastically in 2015, something which the report claims is due to the fact that the company's sales have largely been sluggish this year.
Citing Samsung's regulatory filing, the report reveals that of the three CEOs, Kwon Oh-hyun - who is also the vice chairman - was the highest paid this year with 3.82 billion won ($3.25 million) salary, down from 6.25 billion won he received last year.
Yoo Boo-keun - who is head of the company's consumer electronics business division - received 2.34 billion won, down from 3.61 billion won last year. Mobile business chief Shin Jong-kyun saw the largest drop, receiving just 2.28 billion won this year compared to 12.03 billion won in 2014.
It's worth mentioning that the decrease in overall salaries was due to a drastic drop in incentives, which are usually related to the company's performance.
The revelation comes over a couple of weeks after there were reports that Samsung is planning to lay off managerial-level workers and executives in an effort to cut more costs.

Read more »