Samsung says it sold 1M Z1 Tizen phones, will launch several more in 2015 according to source
Se Young Lee / Reuters :
Context & Ripple Effects
Six months after Samsung launched the Tizen-powered Z1 in India at $92, the company says the entry-level handset has passed one million units — and sources say several more Tizen phones are coming this year. That makes Tizen a real, if modest, shipping product line rather than an experiment.
The phone push runs alongside Samsung's parallel bet on the OS elsewhere: it already committed to running new 2015 smart TVs on Tizen, and it is repositioning manufacturing for cheap handsets with an Indonesia assembly target of 1.5M units a month. The Z1 number is the first sales evidence that the low-cost, own-OS strategy can move volume.
First-order effects
- Samsung now has a proven sub-$100 Tizen seller in India and will extend the Z1 lineup in 2015, giving its budget portfolio a second OS option alongside Android.
- Every Z1 shipped deepens Tizen's installed base, which directly supports the TV-side commitment Samsung made earlier in the year.
Second-order effects
- A growing Tizen handset line gives Samsung leverage over Google on Android licensing and services terms, since the world's largest phone maker would no longer be wholly dependent on a single OS.
- The volume profile matches Samsung's broader mix shift — by Q3, cheap devices like the Galaxy J drove growth with 38% of phones sold priced below $200 — pushing component suppliers and assembly partners to optimize for ultra-low-cost builds.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Samsung institutionalizes a two-tier OS strategy: Android for flagships, Tizen where price dominates — reducing Google's hold over the low end of the market.
- Successive generations of a homegrown OS on cheap hardware could eventually let Samsung control its own software update cadence and services distribution across both phones and TVs, something no other Android OEM has attempted at scale.
The trend: Samsung is using budget devices in emerging markets to build a hedge OS against Android dependence, with Tizen spanning phones and TVs as one platform bet.