Project PDA

Samsung had accounting for a loss first time since the start in 2000, - and just in the traditionally strong Christmas sales period. Reason was, according to the company's dramatic fall in prices in the business for memory chips, flat screens and mobile phones. The bottom line was the shortfall in the period October to December 20 billion Korean Won (KRW), around 11 million euros. Turnover rose slightly by 5.5 percent to 18.5 trillion won.

In the Christmas quarter, Samsung sold 53 million phones, an increase of 2 percent over the previous quarter. That was not the general price decline in mobile telephony field. The average selling price of mobile phones dropped by 10 percent, what the operating margin in the mobile phone business from 7 to 2 percent expressed. Operating profit stood at 160 billion won (91 million euros), but positive.

In 2009 the company expects the mobile business continues to grow and reached the 2008 mark of 200 million units sold to increase. Samsung believes this objective with the focus on high-end smartphones and touch-screen models for developed markets and an expansion of the production of inexpensive entry-level phones for emerging and developing markets. Overall, the group sees a recovery in prices and a rising demand for mobile phones, memory chips and flat screens, but only in the second quarter of 2009.