Samsung and the iPhone's challenge

The birth of Apple iPhone has pushed the race of mobile phone manufacturers to the climax. iPhone increases the demand of mobile phone users twice as much as music, email or TV phone devices. This may make Samsung, and other leading phone makers, face Apple.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs said the launch of the iPhone prompted Apple to enter the mobile phone market. The Mac-powered touch-sensitive phone has music, surf the net, and other entertainment features . The company is planning to start selling iPhones to Cingular Wireless - power network. America's largest mobile phone - this June.

Kim Jeong-han, vice president of commercial telecommunications company Samsung Electronics, said an iPhone (priced at $ 500 or $ 600 depending on memory capacity) will easily penetrate the mobile phone market. That's where Samsung - with multifunctional devices like BlackJack - plays an important role. Users will be able to purchase BlackJack devices for $ 200 instead of $ 450 if they sign up for a 2-year contract with Cingular.

" But we still have plenty of opportunities, and we will continue to produce more mobile devices with special features in the multimedia field ," Kim added.

Samsung may still have other benefits from iPhone launches. As the world's largest chip maker, Samsung has provided chips for Apple NAND flash memory in the company's digital music player - iPod. And so Samsung will also supply this chip to the iPhone.

Vu Phan Trung