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Gadgets HTC Closes South Korean Office After Getting Obliterated in Local Sales
Jason Mick (Blog) - July 30, 2012 1:30 PM

20 comment(s) - last by bigboxes.. on Jul 31 at 9:07 AM

Office is third to be closed in last two months

Taiwan's HTC Corp. (TPE:2498) is one of the largest Android phonemakers in the world, but the company has fallen out of contention for the lead as the smartphone market has evolved into a "two-horse" race between South Korea's Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd. (KSC:005930) and American device-maker Apple, Inc. (AAPL).

Amid falling profits HTC has been forced to make cuts. Today it announced one of those cuts -- the closure of its South Korean office.

HTC remains a player in the U.S. in terms of market share, but in South Korea it owns only a tiny 1 percent sliver of the market. That number is actually down from the 2 percent it held in the country last year.

Samsung obviously tops South Korean sales charts, but LG Electronics Inc. (KSC:066570) also has been doing well. And Pantech Comp., Ltd. has also proven an emerging threat on the market. Together LG, Samsung, and Pantech own 90 percent of South Korea's sales, with foreign handset makers like Apple eating up the remainder.

_{HTC has closed several offices as part of a downsizing plan. [Image Source: Reuters]}

HTC in June shuttered its Brazil office, another weak sales region. Like in South Korea, in Brazil HTC only held 1 percent of the market. HTC has encouraged employees from both offices to apply for a transfer to other regions.

Also in June HTC closed the doors of a research office in Durham, North Carolina, releasing approximately 50 employees.

The company has faced extra pressure in recent months from a weak Euro and from strong sales of Samsung's best-selling Galaxy S III smartphone, which launched in late June to international acclaim.

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RE: I love my EVOLTE

By michael2k on 7/30/2012 6:09:28 PM , Rating: 2

Given how poorly they have performed worldwide, it might be accurate to say that HTC doesn't know how to run a business. On top of that, HTC has always had less than 3% market share in Korea, no matter how awesome their phones may have been.

Even Apple has only managed to grab 9% of the market.

Stupid spam filter won't let me post links!

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RE: I love my EVOLTE

By seamonkey79 on 7/30/2012 7:38:15 PM , Rating: 2

They don't know how to advertise, and Samsung does. HTC went from being an OEM for the phone companies to marketing their own phones, but doesn't have the experience of actually marketing to the end user that Samsung has had practice with for... ever. Even LG has far more experience gearing stuff towards the end user, plus a name that's rather known to go with it. Samsung makes good hardware, has a name to go with it, and still hasn't had the 'bad-name' of lack of support catch up to it in the phone world like has started happening in the TV and other consumer electronics world. That alone makes them far better at the phone game than HTC... although I'll keep buying my HTCs until they simply make an utter piece of trash.

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