Recent reports have suggested that the upcoming ‘LG G7’, which was expected to launch at Mobile World Congress 2018, will not only be rebranded, but also effectively redesigned from scratch and pushed back to April at the earliest.
LG’s smartphone division has been a drag on the company’s bottom line for several years, but it has still launched a pair of flagship phones every year. Last week, the Korea Herald reported that vice chairman and CEO of LG Electronics Jo Seong-jin confirmed the company wouldn’t bother with a firm yearly release schedule anymore, and now the other shoe has dropped. According to a new report, LG has halted development on the LG G7, which was expected to debut in mere weeks.
Despite the G6 and V30 being fairly good phones, LG’s mobile division has continued to report losses year after year. Again, last week at CES, LG announced that it would no longer release smartphones on a yearly schedule, instead opting to launch new models “when it is needed.” According to a new report from The Investor, LG CEO and Vice Chairman Jo Seong-jin told the company to start over on the upcoming G7 flagship.
This news comes, again, from the Korea Herald, which spoke with an unnamed LG official under condition of anonymity. After Jo made his cryptic remarks, this official claims the order came down to stop work on the in-development G7 hardware. The team had hoped to have the device ready for Mobile World Congress in late February, but that now seems impossible.
The company has reportedly failed to find a strong selling point for the device it designed. The G7 was supposed to sport slimmer bezels than the G6 with another 18:9 display. The device would also have been thinner and lighter, more like the V30. However, does this offer a compelling alternative to Samsung’s Galaxy phones? Jo apparently didn’t think so.
It’s unclear how much of a “do-over” LG’s mobile unit is getting. Starting completely from scratch would mean no flagship launch this year, but it’s likely the company will stick with the same board design and hardware specs. Changes to the industrial design and features should be doable in the space of a few months.
A revamped LG G7 could debut as soon as April, but it might not even have that name. Jo is reportedly considering a new branding strategy for the company’s phones. LG has not released any official statements on the changes.
