amidst RAMageddon, Samsung not to change pricing of S26

[Marees]

samsung makes so much margin from memory fabs that they decided to cross-subsidize their device hardware

Samsung To Absorb Costs To Prevent A Price Increase For Galaxy S26 Series, Galaxy Z Fold8 And Flip8 To Go On A Diet With A Bigger Battery​

In doing so, Samsung is trying to retain price parity with Apple, which launched the iPhone 17 at $799 in September 2025, despite bumping up the base storage to 256GB.

https://wccftech.com/samsung-to-eat...-flip8-to-go-on-a-diet-with-a-bigger-battery/


via grok — https://x.com/i/grok/share/QTzpKXESxeLEfSmOg5dYax8QF

• Samsung's decision to maintain Galaxy S26 pricing at $799 for the base model marks the fourth consecutive year of stability, countering rising component costs to defend against Apple and Chinese competitors, as reported by PhoneArena and Android Police.
• The post estimates a 10-15% gross margin reduction on the S26 series due to unchanged prices, a pragmatic trade-off since Samsung's high-margin DRAM and NAND memory chips—generating over 30% of revenue per recent earnings—offset mobile division pressures.
• This strategy aligns with broader foldable lineup pricing freezes, while mid-range Galaxy A models see hikes, balancing consumer appeal in flagships with profitability in budget segments.

 

[DukenukemX]

It's a good thing Samsung was able to convince themselves not to increase prices. I'm glad they talked themselves out of it.

 

[Aurelius]

While it's not at all surprising that Samsung could do this, I'm glad that it is (provided the rumor is true, of course).

Not that it really has much choice. Unless Apple blinks and hikes prices mid-cycle, Samsung simply has to maintain price parity — if an S26 costs noticeably more than the equivalent iPhone, many people will choose the iPhone. As it stands, there's a concern that the S26 will be too iterative where Apple made some significant and sometimes much-needed changes (for the base iPhone 17 in particular). A price increase would only compound that problem.

 

[sfsuphysics]

But aren't they the ones making the memory for their phones? It's laughable to claim they are going to "absorb the cost" because the cost isn't because resources needed to produce memory are increasing, nor is it the cost making said memory, it's because too much demand for it so their are jacking the rates up, but now they are "absorbing the cost". Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely genius on their part, because while their competitors can't "absorb the cost" since their competitors aren't making the chips that go into said phones, they can get a price advantage against them and bring more into their ecosystem. Another side is if Korean corporate tax laws are as idiotic as US corporate tax laws they can also say they're selling phones for a loss because the memory (that they also sell) cost more.

 

[DanNeely]

But aren't they the ones making the memory for their phones? It's laughable to claim they are going to "absorb the cost" because the cost isn't because resources needed to produce memory are increasing, nor is it the cost making said memory, it's because too much demand for it so their are jacking the rates up, but now they are "absorbing the cost". Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely genius on their part, because while their competitors can't "absorb the cost" since their competitors aren't making the chips that go into said phones, they can get a price advantage against them and bring more into their ecosystem. Another side is if Korean corporate tax laws are as idiotic as US corporate tax laws they can also say they're selling phones for a loss because the memory (that they also sell) cost more.

Samsung isn't a unified monolith; and it's various sub-companies regularly do what benefits them most at the expense of throwing their peers under the bus. The most visible case of this has been their phones in much of the world using Qualcomm CPUs instead of their own.

Samsung's ram division choosing to charge their phone division an extra $200/device or even strangle the latter by selling what would have been an internal allocation to OpenAI instead would be business as usual in the scorpion bucket.

I'm really curious if it's Samsung's foundary that's eating the loss by selling ram internally for last years price, or the phone division absorbing a large increase in costs because they're being forced to pay market rates for their ram.

 

[LukeTbk]

Another side is if Korean corporate tax laws are as idiotic as US corporate tax laws they can also say they're selling phones for a loss because the memory (that they also sell) cost more.

corporate tax being on profits is all around the world and all around the world it is never a good idea to loss a dollar to save 25 cent in tax.

If they had a 40% margin, a reduction by 10-15% would be down to 34-36%, not the end of the world at all.

 

[Marees]

I'm really curious if it's Samsung's foundary that's eating the loss by selling ram internally for last years price, or the phone division absorbing a large increase in costs because they're being forced to pay market rates for their ram.

and what will be the impact on appraisals & target based bonuses in both companies/divisions ??