Samsung pulls trifold phone from market after only three months
by Séamus Bellamy · Boing BoingWell, that de-escalated quickly.
A few years ago, I saw Samsung's proof-of-concept tri-fold screen prototype at MWC in Barcelona. Neat! It had me looking forward to the possibility of a full-sized tablet that fits in your pocket. More often than not, proofs of concept like this never make it into consumer products. But earlier this year, the company, known for its single-fold foldables, released the tri-fold Samsung Galaxy Z Trifold: a folding handset that costs close to $3,000.
When folded up, it worked like a normal, if chonky, smartphone. But after gingerly unfurling its inner display, users of the Z Trifold had access to a 10-inch display. After just three months on the market in the United States, Samsung is retiring the device.
It's an odd one: the Z Trifold was selling well despite its high price. Hell, it was even going down like pancakes in grey market sales at inflated prices on sites like eBay. Edgelords love them some weird hardware that few folks have, and they're willing to pay a premium for the bragging rights of owning it.
I like Ars Technica's take on why the device might be getting pulled from the market: the rising cost of memory and storage. The Z Trifold ships with a minimum of 16GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. With the device's already steep price, the margins might be low enough that an increase in production costs could make producing more handsets a financially shitty idea.
Hopefully, it'll be back when this stupid chip shortage is straightened out. I'm a folding phone convert: there are few devices as great for getting work done on the go, if you dig having a minimal EDC setup, as I do.
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