Samsung designs for the future
July 2, 2004 | 12:00am
In the future, how do we define "the office"? Is it solely confined to a specific space with all the necessary appendages – computer, telephone, fax, phone lines, modem, Internet, the machiavellian boss breathing down the necks of employees, etc.? Or is technology turning things around, redefining them? Opening up strange possibilities. Blurring the line between cold empirical reality and chilly science fiction. Inviting everyone into a brave new world of wonder.
Sang Youl Eom – president and CEO of Samsung Electronics Philippines – philosophizes about a future that is quickly metamorphosing into the present. Thanks to technological and design advancements made by companies such as Samsung.
"Nowadays, if you got a PDA phone, printer and camera, you can work. This is (what you call) lifestyle convergence. You can get data from your pocket computer and you’re all set. This is very important, especially in areas with very heavy traffic," Eom said.
Heavy traffic? We Metro Manilans have it for breakfast, lunch, dinner and midnight snack. We love the smell of carbon monoxide in the morning (irony, mine; source, Apocalypse Now). We see ten million cars trying to squeeze into ten yards of space. We’re running late. We’re always running late. We’re wasting precious time being stuck on the corner of Edsa and the void. And all the while the things to do in the office are multiplying like amoebas. Paperwork can self-regenerate in dark drawers, you know. What do we do while being stuck in traffic? Well, we could read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. We could listen to songs (revivals, to be more precise) from horrible local American Idol rip-offs, and wish we were listening to the ranting of our bosses instead. Or we could already work our butts off.
Technology, said Eom, is making working anywhere (the car, the house, the supermarket, the backseat of a cab that smells of greed and body odor) possible.
"In the future, there will be no need to go to the office," he shared. "Our whole lifestyle will be changed."
What’s on display at the recent CommunicAsia 2004 exhibition in Singapore was exactly that – a lifestyle in a state of flux.
Since its inaugural event in 1979, CommunicAsia is recognized industry-wide as Asia’s largest ever communications and IT trade event. Held this year at Singapore Expo, this event offers a comprehensive range of mobile networks and applications, network technologies and satellite communications. Samsung Electronics Philippines invited me along with two other writers to see for ourselves the fruits of blood, sweat and technological toil.
Dig the list of things of hi-tech gadgets and products on display: antennas, artificial intelligence, Bluetooth technology, routers, CD and DVD duplicators, climate control systems, digital microwave radios, foldable mouse, video-on-demand, voice recognition products and services, voltage stabilizers, wireless modems, wireless MP3 players… whew. Stuff that only Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick could conjure. Not anymore. Companies such as Samsung have something to do with that.
"Samsung Electronics is going towards products that are time-saving, space-saving and designed for convergence – not only technological convergence, but lifestyle convergence as well," said Eom.
PHILIPPINE STAR: What is your design philosophy?
INGON PARK: Coming up with simple designs with a few "wow" elements in it. In designing the SGH-E800 (the new Samsung cell phone), our direction was more toward putting in enjoyment and refinement elements. To marry function with entertainment was our goal.
Is there a thrust toward coming up with even smaller phones in the future?
We want to go as small as we can. But going compact is something engineering dictates, not design.
How do you gauge user-feedback?
We have user testing in Europe, Asia and America. They are mainly to test the usability of the phones. We get inspiration from customers, from trends, from the market. But I believe designers should be inspired by something different. Designers should lead the customers, instead of just following them.
Who do you consider your closest competitors?
In terms of technology, we don’t have any competitors. What we observed is that technology trend moves so fast, but after a while it is bound to get more stable. That’s when design trends go forward. Design is never really stable. For Samsung (at the present moment), going more stylish is the main trend – whether (coming up with mobiles for) businessman or young professional. The new Samsung phones are stylish, unique and with interesting functions.
Do you get ideas from offbeat sources like, say, sci-fi movies or modern art?
We get inspiration from the future. There is team of (in-house) designers preparing the future of Samsung phones. We work with famous European designers and we also get fresh ideas from design students. We have design branches in London, Shanghai, San Francisco and Tokyo as well.
What’s the inspiration for the E800?
Our thrust in making this phone is diversity. After creating the E700 we created the E800 in a span of a year. The shape of the E800 reminds people of the acorn or the chestnut. It is rounded and stylish. Our goal was to make the world’s smallest sliding phone.
Is smaller, necessarily better?
Depends on the customer. As the phone gets smaller, so does the screen. But what if you want play games on the phone, or watch NBA games or movies? (Yes, you can do that with Samsung phones.) You need a bigger screen.
What are the profiles of Samsung users?
We have three types of Samsung customers: the fashionable, who like smaller, more stylish phones with great outlook; the businessmen, who like efficiency and usability; and the techies, who want the phone in the market with the latest features – even if it is as huge as a brick (laughs). But the trend is already changing. The categories are already shifting. (What’s constant is that) fancy and kitsch are not our areas. Samsung is into the refine and the premium.
The new Samsung mobile fits easily in the palm of one’s hand and boasts an outstanding tactile grip – a far cry from the pangkaskas ng yelo mobiles we had in recent history. It also slides up easily, almost automatically. For those who love to take self-portraits photos (read: almost everyone on the planet), the SGH-E800 has a small mirror on the back of its body.
Samsung’s latest baby joins the company’s other mobiles that combine, according to Samsung executive Christian Collins, "power and grace" – the power of technology and the grace of good design.
The SGH-Z105 offers video-on-demand, video streaming and video messaging functions. The twist-and-flip SGH-P730 is a megapixel camera phone with a built-in MP3 player. The SGH-D710 with a large screen is the mobile phone built for multi-tasking. The SGH-E500, which comes decked with gemstones, has a feminine design and is ideal for a ladies’ night-out. The SGH-X900 is the model with 128 MB MP3 player, external speakers and a camera.
Eom revealed that Samsung was the first to develop the flip-type phone, as well as the color panel and the polyphonic ring-tones. How does he feel when competitors incorporate Samsung features into their own mobile models? The Samsung executive saw absolutely nothing wrong with that.
"That’s okay," he enthused. "We always try to keep a step ahead. And if there’s one thing that Samsung stands for, it’s total value. "
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