Samsung Unveils Slim New Phone to Compete with Motorola RAZR

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Samsung Unveils Slim New Phone to Compete with Motorola RAZR

6:00 am on April 6, 2006 | Category: Mobile Devices

Samsung Electronics announced yesterday that it plans to launch its slimmest ever cell phone in the US market, in an effort to compete with Motorola’s popular RAZR phone.

The Samsung T509 will come equipped with an external memory slot and color display capable of playing videos. It’s silver candy-bar design will be a mere 9.8 millimeters thick, making it far thinner than Motorola’s 14.8mm RAZR or 11.5mm SLVR models.

The South Korean company hopes that it can use this launch as a way to boost its share of the American market, where it is in a heated three-way battle for second place with LG and Nokia. If Samsung can turn this phone into a hit, it could even have an impact on the company’s global standing, where it ranks number three behind Nokia and Motorola.

“I don’t know of anybody else that’s doing anything this slim this year,” said Samsung’s senior vice president, Peter Skarzynski.

One notable disadvantage of the T509 is its lack of a digital camera, a feature that has become a near-given in this type of advanced handset. If you don’t need to take and send photographs, however, this is a very trendy phone in most other ways.

Samsung hasn’t yet given any final word on exactly how much the T509 will cost, but expects it to launch sometime in May on the T-Mobile USA network.

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I’m very interested in getting a very slim, very light “world” phone… one that will work both in the U.S. as well as in Europe and the Far East. I read last week about Samsung’s SGH-X820 and the SGH-D900. The T509 sounds like the SGH-X820, only without the camera. Ultra-slimness, ultra-light weight and “world” communications capabilities are my 3 must-haves. MP3 and camera capabilities are nice-to-haves. Does the T509 have “world” communications capabilities, or does one of Samsung’s other phones have my big 3?

Comment by Larry Stark — May 16, 2006 #