Samsung Galaxy S5 Skipping Mobile World Congress

It looks like Samsung may not be launching its next generation Galaxy S5 flagship next month at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Instead, the company may be launching the much anticipated and coveted Galaxy S5 at a private event in mid-March.

“Samsung to hold its next Global launch in London,” a tweet from @flapic read, citing “a reliable source.”

This is unsurprising given that Samsung had chosen private venues to hold its flagship launches in recent years rather than relying on trade shows, like CES or MWC. This strategy would highlight the products that Samsung wants to launch, rather than have the company’s news be buried under news from competing companies.

At this time, Samsung has not made any announcements, though the company’s executives have recently been more loose-lipped about the Galaxy S5. It’s believed that the device could begin shipping to consumers as early as April.

Prior to CES last week, there were speculations that slowing sales of the flagship Galaxy S4 along with pressures from Apple with the recent introduction of the iPhone 5s may force Samsung to reveal its hands early and a launch event for the Galaxy S5 would be pushed earlier into the year. However, this was not the case for CES and we’ll have to wait and see what Sasmung’s plans are for MWC.

One of the challenges right now for launching the Galaxy S5 is the availability of next-generation technology that would make the flagship phone stand out from the competition. Apple had shocked the world when it introduced the iPhone 5s with the 64-bit ARM CPU support inside the Apple A7, and Samsung likely will have to wait for 64-but ARM chips to be ready for the Galaxy S5 to be a standout phone when compared against the competition. Additionally, the push for massive multi-core computing, changes to the design to include premium metal materials, and a focus on imaging with optical image stabilized cameras could all potentially be factors that would lead Samsung to launching the device later, rather than sooner.

Given that Samsung may be waiting for the availability of these technologies, not only will the release of the Galaxy S5 need to be coordinated, but also the announcement of the device. In the past, when Gotta Be Mobile spoke with Samsung Mobile reps, we were told that it was part of the company’s evolving strategy to have a shorter launch and availability window so that consumers wouldn’t have to wait a long time for the device to be released.