Source: The Galaxy S5 was launched at MWC to divert the attention away from the lack of innovation

BY Rita El Khoury

Published 7 Mar 2014

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Take this report with a grain of salt, as it appears on Business Korea with a header image of the Galaxy S5 that is anything but the actual phone — it’s in fact a concept render of the Galaxy S4 from 2012 — but the site’s “sources” explained a few reasons why the S5 was unveiled at MWC and not at a standalone Samsung Unpacked event as was the case with its predecessors.

One of these reasons, as unveiled by an industry source, is the lack of innovation. The Galaxy S5 was long rumored to have a metal body, a 20MP camera sensor, a 2K display and even an iris scanner. Expectations were set high and the real product had none of these features, leaving everyone slightly underwhelmed.

“Actually, there is a general consensus among Samsung employees about a lack of product innovation, even before the Galaxy S5 was revealed […] To the best of my knowledge, Samsung decided to showcase the new model at MWC 2014, rather than through a separate Unpacked event, because it was much easier to divert attention away from the innovation problem.”

Another reason explained by a Samsung executive is the company’s need to bring back the focus on its brand in Europe, as their portfolio has been seeing some “better-than-expected competition” from the iPhone 5S.

While there might be some meat to this report, I would be remiss not to point out that the “disappointment” over the S5 from press members who were expecting fireworks and hurricanes is quite overstated. Anyone who follows smartphone news should know by now that early leaks and rumors are invariably untrustworthy and overly optimistic — should I remind you of the touch-sensitive iPhone back rumors for example? — and that the sales won’t be impacted because people who are going to buy these devices won’t notice the lack of a mythical feature that they didn’t know they should expect.

[Via: r/Android]