Samsung moves AI front and centre of smartphone range

For Annika Bizon, artificial intelligence has one simple role: to make things easier. The new head of Samsung’s mobile experience for Ireland and the UK has taken over the role at a time when AI features have piqued consumers’ interest.

But it can also be confusing.

“People chuck the word AI out all over the place,” says Bizon. “The job we had was how do we make it make sense?”

That is a key challenge facing companies, particularly ones that are dealing directly with consumers. In a market where ChatGPT has dominated the AI conversation, it is sometimes forgotten that AI is broader than chatbots and in some form or other has been implemented in technology for years. That includes smartphones, although it might not necessarily be in the most attention-grabbing form.

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“AI has been in the background for a long time,” she says. “Some of the key things for people are battery life – basic battery life. AI helps your battery work better for you because it learns behaviours.” The implication is that by learning an individual consumer’s behaviour, the system can use that information to improve battery life, arguably a more useful application than a programme that can tell jokes or write believable stories.

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Like many companies, Samsung needed to make AI work for it, and particularly for its consumers, rather than including the technology for the sake of it.

Bizon has worked with Samsung since June 2021, when she joined as head of marketing and omnichannel director at the mobile maker’s Ireland and UK operations. In her new role, she also overseas the commercial operations of the mobile maker in the Republic.

Sometimes the features can have a very male focus. These are very real things that people use on a day-to-day basis

Appointed in January, the first big launch under Bizon’s tenure was the Samsung Galaxy S24 line, that went heavy on artificial intelligence features from photography to bringing in live translation for calls and live conversations, among other new features.

The new devices seem, at first glance at least, to have satisfied the market’s demand for increasingly flashier AI-powered features, the kind that takes years of research and development to do properly. The solution was to draft in some expertise from Google to bring new functions to Samsung’s flagship range of phones, powering the GalaxyAI features.

The decision seems to have been a sound one. Google’s “circle to search” feature, for example, has got a lot of attention online. It is one of the more popular additions to the Galaxy line up, simply because it is one of the most useful. By circling something on a web page, you can search for it online. Nothing complicated, but extremely useful.

Bizon notes that the circle to search feature has broad appeal, including with women users.

“Sometimes the features can have a very male focus,” she says “These are very real things that people use on a day-to-day basis.”

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Other features include Chat Assist, which will not only translate messages for you, but also change the tone. New photo editing features allow users to remove objects, reflections and shadows from images, change backgrounds and create composite photographs to get the best image possible.

As the travel season approaches, the popularity of other features, such as the live translation, should come to the fore. It could also prove invaluable to business customers who may have relationships with companies overseas. Being able to translate calls in real time opens up the business to new relationships.

Add in the fact that much of the work is done on the phone, it strips out at least some of the concerns over privacy that comes with relying on the cloud to translate recordings, not to mention the issue of data coverage and potential additional charges for using it.

Pixel is a small part of the market. Working with us, on a broader level, we bring in premium smartphones

For those using Google’s own Pixel 8 phones, the addition of AI to Samsung handsets isn’t as groundbreaking. The functionality is part of the core system and. although in a way the two companies are rivals, they also have a beneficial partnership.

“Android’s number one job is to grow the premium sector and grow the market,” says Bizon. “Pixel is a small part of the market. Working with us, on a broader level, we bring in premium smartphones. They want to support those, and they want to support this technology in a broad way.”

Google, Bizon says, has been a partner with Samsung in the past, and that is one area she would like to expand in the future in Ireland.

“One of the things I want to do in the Irish market is bring in some of that mindset with the Android team to grow and do some of the stuff we’ve done in the UK,” she says.

Smartphones are an increasingly tough market. The most recent data from StatCounter estimates Samsung had a little over a third of the market in February 2024, behind Apple at 44 per cent and ahead of rivals Google and Xiaomi, which had just over 4 per cent each.

The replacement cycle is lengthening too, aided by increased support from mobile makers for security and software updates. As competition increases for the market that remains and the hardware gap narrows, software has become a new weapon in persuading consumers to switch brands.

Samsung, like other manufacturers in the smartphone industry, has a core fan base who are loyal. But the advent of the AI features may be key in attracting a whole new customer base to the brand.

“We are seeing young people come in,” says Bizon. “It feels like it is a big step change for us.”

AI should be for everyone and the only way you’re going to make it a completely open space that everyone gets to experience

The Galaxy AI features won’t be limited to just the flagship S24 this year; Samsung is rolling it out to older phones. That will eliminate the fear of missing out that owners of last year’s S23 adopters may have. The company will extend AI to less expensive smartphones in the Samsung range.

“AI should be for everyone and the only way you’re going to make it a completely open space that everyone gets to experience,” says Bizon. “A phone is a big investment. You don’t want to know that six months later, it’s out of date. That’s not fair on our consumers and actually builds a negative perception of something that is positive.”

The decision to bring in Google for AI has put Samsung ahead of its long time rival Apple in that space. The iPhone maker has been seen as a little behind the times in generative AI and AI photo editing for iPhone users.

But the head start might be short-lived. Reports in recent days indicate that Apple is seeking an AI partnership with Google that would bring the company’s Gemini AI to iPhones. The news came via unnamed sources speaking to Bloomberg on negotiations around licensing Gemini for new features coming to the iPhone software later this year. However, the exact terms or branding of the AI have not yet been decided.

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Apple also recently completed the acquisition of an AI start-up, DarwinAI, signalling its intention to broaden its own artificial intelligence capabilities in-house. The company has developed AI technology for visually inspecting components during the manufacturing process and is notable for its work in optimising AI systems for efficiency and speed.

A similar deal brought voice assistant Siri into IOS, now an integral part of Apple’s ecosystem.

The integration of powerful AI tools into mobile systems, however, will also require companies to tread carefully, particularly around the manipulation of images and video with tools that may not be immediately obvious to the average viewer. “With great new technology comes huge responsibility,” says Bizon. “You’ve got to have some rules.”

One thing is certain: the market is certainly about to get a lot more interesting and competitive.

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