Samsung’s ‘Make for India’ innovation team at SRI-Noida

Samsung India, the country’s biggest smartphone maker, has consolidated its position as the market leader in 2016, following the launch of several new Galaxy J models. Today, every third smartphone sold in India is a Galaxy J, according to syndicated data.

The Galaxy J series smartphones pack a punch with locally developed Ultra Data Saving (UDS) mode, S bike mode and Turbo Speed Technology, among others. The huge popularity of these ‘Make for India’ features shows that localization is important for technology to succeed. It also showcases the world-class innovation being done by Samsung India’s research & development (R&D) teams.

Mr. Dipesh Shah, Managing Director, Samsung R&D Institute India

Samsung’s R&D initiatives in India are headed by Dipesh Shah, the Managing Director of Samsung R&D Institute in Bangalore. The R&D Institute in Bangalore, popularly called SRI-B, is Samsung’s biggest research centre outside Korea.

Under Mr. Shah, a ‘Make for India Task Force’ was formed, comprising employees from Samsung’s R&D, innovation, products and marketing divisions. These teams spent hours to understand the needs of the average Indian user.

Following days of brainstorming and pouring over customer insights, surveys and research reports, the ‘Make for India Task Force’ drew up a list of India-specific features that could appeal to young users, the potential customers of the Galaxy J series.

For instance, the Ultra Data Saving feature was necessitated by the average Indian’s tendency to preserve data, given the fact that internet is still a luxury for millions of Indians struggling to make ends meet.

The S bike mode was shortlisted, following realization that incoming calls are a major distraction to millions of bikers. A majority of bikers would snug their phones up in their helmets to take calls, putting their lives at danger. The findings of Samsung’s research became the basis of development of the S bike mode.

Today, the feature has been implemented in Latin America, the Middle East and South West Asia, following its success in India.

Most of the ‘Make for India’ innovations in the Galaxy J series, including the widely popular Ultra Data Saving (UDS) and S bike mode, were planned and executed by teams in Samsung Research Institute in Noida (SRI-Noida).

Mr. Tasleem Arif, Group Leader, Advanced R&D ‘Make for India’ Innovation Group, SRI-Noida

India is known as a software powerhouse across the globe and to leverage India’s software talent, Samsung has established three R&D centres in Delhi, Noida and Bangalore. The success of localized innovations provides Samsung India’s R&D teams their moment in the sun.

A wholesome experience, where the smartphone and its features, are in harmony with each other, is what the consumer is looking for, and that is precisely why the Galaxy J series has become India’s most popular phone model, with a 30% share of the total smartphone sales in the country, according to syndicated data.

Launched in 2015, the Galaxy J series combines Samsung’s world-class technology with local ‘Make for India’ innovations.

Take for instance, the Ultra Data Saving (UDS) mode, which provides up to 50% mobile data savings with data compression. UDS was the first ‘Make for India’ innovation to be adopted on a mass level in September 2015. Besides data saving, UDS delivers up to 2X battery standby time and frees up 11% RAM, leading to faster device performance. UDS saw over 50% adoption among Galaxy J series users and has led to the savings of a cumulative of over 30,000 GB data so far.

The success of the UDS bolstered Samsung India’s local R&D teams, encouraging them to come up with more localized innovations. The widely popular S bike mode was next. Launched in March 2016, the S bike mode encourages responsible riding and ensures a tension-free ride. The S bike mode has also seen over 50% adoption among Galaxy J series smartphone users.

“Innovation at Samsung revolves around the consumer as we aspire to bring a complete hardware and software solution. The revolutionary S bike mode has been designed in India by our engineers to not only propagate responsible riding which is a concern for both consumers and government authorities, but also ensure a tension free ride,” said Mr. Dipesh Shah, Managing Director, Samsung R&D Institute India.

Mr. Dipesh Shah, Managing Director, Samsung R&D Institute India

Buoyed by success of S bike mode, the India R&D team literally stepped on the gas. The Turbo Speed Technology (TST) was next. Introduced in July 2016, TST results in superior device performance, with native apps loading up to 40% faster than devices with double the RAM. For this, Samsung rewrote native apps such as camera, gallery, and contacts, etc. that are most frequently used. TST also proactively shuts down idle processes running in the background and declutters RAM using its intelligent memory system to ensure resources like RAM and processor are free and ready to take on new tasks, thereby extending fastest in-class experience.

Today, the Galaxy J series smartphones are packed with several other interesting and meaningful innovations, such as the Smart Glow, which allows users to take selfies with rear camera and customize colours for notifications and call alerts.

There is also the S Power Planning, for instance, which is a smart battery management system that empowers users to stay connected at all times, and S Secure that ensures the safest browsing experience and provides privacy features to keep personal information protected.

Another feature allows J series user to draw battery charge from another J series smartphone, when the phone is down and there is no power source or power bank to fall back on.

Market share data shows consumers have indeed given a thumbs-up to these ‘Make for India’ innovations.

These features, backed by Samsung’s cutting edge technology and design, helped Samsung consolidate its leadership position in the fiercely competitive India smartphone market. Samsung India ended 2016 with record sales.

It also validates Samsung’s philosophy of putting customers at the centre of its innovation.

Samsung India, the country’s number 1 smartphone maker, ended 2016 on a high note, with record sales of mobile phones. Samsung’s cutting-edge technology and “Make for India” innovations, which provide local flavour in the fiercely-competitive domestic market, are some of the reasons behind Samsung’s strong showing in 2016.

The revolutionary S bike mode is among the “Make for India” features that Samsung unveiled last year. Launched in March 2016, the S bike mode encourages responsible riding and ensures a tension-free ride.

It is also the perfect embodiment of Samsung’s vision, which is the pursuit of meaningful innovations to make people’s lives better.

To develop the S-bike mode, Samsung engineers spent hours studying consumers’ phone usage behaviour. It was then that they realized that incoming calls are a major distraction to millions of bikers. A majority of bikers would snug their phones up in their helmets to take calls, putting their lives at danger. The findings of Samsung’s research became the basis of development of the S bike mode.

Just why most Galaxy J series users love S bike mode

Seven months after its launch, the S bike mode remains the only dedicated phone safety feature for two-wheeler riders in India, with an adoption rate of 50 per cent among Galaxy J series smartphone users.

The S bike mode sports an intuitive user interface, allowing users to see a log of call notifications, while the mode is enabled. It also has a Smart Reply feature, where selected contacts will receive an auto-SMS with an estimate of when the user is likely to be available for a call. This feature works on the basis of trip destination entered by the user. There is also a dashboard of time and distance travelled using the S bike mode.

Samsung integrated its cutting edge innovation with the Galaxy J3, which is the first affordable segment device equipped with NFC hardware, necessary to activate the S bike mode.

It’s a hardly a surprise then that the Galaxy J series is the most selling affordable smartphone in the country. The S bike mode is the perfect example of an innovation that is really meaningful and useful to people.

How the S bike mode Works

Step 1 – Quick Activation: Galaxy J3 has in-built NFC hardware and the device ships with an S bike mode NFC Tag. This tag can be affixed at a convenient place (e.g. helmet or a fuel tank) and the user can gently tap the device on this tag to activate/deactivate the S bike mode. The user also has the option to use the quick panel to activate/deactivate this feature.

Step 2 – Urgent Call Alert System: All callers hear a pre-recorded message that informs callers that the Galaxy J3 user is riding a two-wheeler and is unable to take the call. The S bike mode user does not get any notification that there was an incoming call (to avoid distraction). In case the call is urgent, the caller may choose to press 1, which allows urgent calls to go through.

Step 3 – Motion Lock: This feature ensures that if the S bike mode user decides to take the urgent incoming call, he will need to bring his bike to a halt to be able to answer the call. The phone will not allow the incoming call to get answered owing to motion lock. This safety feature is designed to encourage responsible riding.

S Bike Rally

Samsung India marked the beginning of a three-day consumer awareness programme today by flagging off the ‘S Bike Rally’ in Srinagar.

Organised in association with the Jammu and Kashmir Traffic Police, the rally was flagged off by Mr. Mohandeep Singh, Vice President Sales, Mobile & IT, Samsung India Electronics and Mr. Masood-ul-Zaman, SSP Traffic, Srinagar, with forty bikers. The bikers, along with pillion riders, were escorted by eight traffic police bikers from The Lalit Grand Palace hotel to Traffic Control Room headquarter covering fifteen prominent traffic signals on the first day of the rally.

Mr. Mohandeep Singh, Vice President Sales, Mobile & IT, Samsung India Electronics, said, “We are delighted to flag off ‘S Bike rally’ in Srinagar in partnership with Jammu & Kashmir traffic police. This unique consumer engagement initiative promotes responsible riding amongst youth, especially bikers. Samsung has always strived to bring meaningful innovations for its consumers and our revolutionary S Bike Mode in our Galaxy J series smartphones ensure peace of mind while riding for bike riders.”

The second day of the initiative will cover ten petrol pumps and seven bike dealers where information on responsible riding and S Bike mode in Samsung’s J series smartphones will be shared with visitors. On the third day, a workshop will be organised in top four colleges of Srinagar to educate the youth about harmless driving measures. SSP-Traffic will attend and oversee these two workshops personally.

Samsung S Bike Mode is a unique feature aimed at encouraging motorcycle riders to not use mobile phones while driving. Once enabled, the S Bike Mode automatically replies to calls with pre-recorded messages in 14 languages, ensuring tension free riding.

How the S bike mode Works

S bike mode was developed and built into the Galaxy J3, J5 (2016) and J7 (2016) following extensive market research aimed to create innovations that are really meaningful and useful to people.

This is how it works:

• Step 1 – Quick Activation: Galaxy J3 has in-built NFC hardware and the device ships with an S bike mode NFC Tag. This tag can be affixed at a convenient place (e.g. helmet or a fuel tank) and the user can gently tap the device on this tag to activate/deactivate the S bike mode. The user also has the option to use the quick panel to activate/deactivate this feature.
• Step 2 – Urgent Call Alert System: All callers hear a pre-recorded message that informs callers that the Galaxy J3 user is riding a two-wheeler and is unable to take the call. The S bike mode user does not get any notification that there was an incoming call (to avoid distraction). In case the call is urgent, the caller may choose to press 1, which allows urgent calls to go through.
• Step 3 – Motion Lock: This feature ensures that if the S bike mode user decides to take the urgent incoming call, he will need to bring his bike to a halt to be able to answer the call. The phone will not allow the incoming call to get answered owing to motion lock. This feature is designed to encourage responsible riding.

The S bike mode also sports an intuitive user interface where users can see a log of call notifications while the mode is enabled. It also has a Smart Reply feature where selected contacts will receive an auto-SMS with an estimate of when the user is likely to be available for a call basis a trip destination entered by the user.

Samsung India Electronics today announced the launch of the Samsung Galaxy J3 featuring the S bike mode, an industry-first dedicated feature for two-wheeler riders that is designed to enable responsible and tension free riding.

Once activated at the beginning of a ride, any caller trying to reach the Samsung Galaxy J3 user will be notified through an automated answering machine that the user is riding and cannot take calls so that the ride remains uninterrupted.

All the user needs to do is to switch on the S bike mode of Galaxy J3 before setting off on the ride, and the smart phone will automatically inform the caller that the user is currently riding a bike and is unable to take the call. The caller may choose to press 1 to express urgency to talk with the biker for which the biker will have to bring his bike to a halt in order to take the call.

“Samsung is constantly in the pursuit of meaningful innovations that make people’s lives better. S bike mode is a result of that vision. While studying the consumers’ phone usage behaviour, we realised that incoming calls are a major distraction to bikers. We are very happy that we have come up with something that will benefit millions of two-wheeler users and promote responsible riding,” said Mr Asim Warsi. Senior Vice President, Samsung India Electronics.

Galaxy J3 is an extension of Samsung’s vision to offer innovative and differentiated products across price segments. The J Series was launched with the Ultra Data Saving (UDS) mode in September 2015, a feature that has helped consumers save up to 50% of mobile data usage. Samsung has further enhanced this feature to include data savings on popular music streaming apps and over Wi-Fi after witnessing an adoption rate of over 50% among consumers. In order to carry the local innovation forward, Samsung is keen to establish the S bike mode as a responsible riding ritual where Samsung Galaxy J3 users will activate the mode before commencing their ride. Both UDS and the newly launched S bike mode have been developed in Samsung’s Indian R&D centres. S bike mode will be available across all 4G-enabled Galaxy J series devices over a period of time.

“Innovation at Samsung revolves around the consumer as we aspire to bring a complete hardware and software solution. Samsung Galaxy J3 is the first affordable segment device that has been equipped with NFC hardware to activate the S bike mode with a single tap of the device on  a S bike NFC tag that will be shipped with every unit. The revolutionary S bike mode has been designed in India by our engineers to not only propagate responsible riding which is a concern for both consumers and government authorities, but also ensure a tension free ride,” Mr. Dipesh Shah, Senior Vice President, Samsung R&D Institute India.

How the S bike mode Works

S bike mode was developed and built into the Galaxy J3 following extensive market research aimed to create innovations that are really meaningful and useful to people.

This is how it works:

• Step 1 – Quick Activation: Galaxy J3 has in-built NFC hardware and the device ships with an S bike mode NFC Tag. This tag can be affixed at a convenient place (eg. helmet or a fuel tank) and the user can gently tap the device on this tag to activate/deactivate the S bike mode. The user also has the option to use the quick panel to activate/deactivate this feature.
• Step 2 – Urgent Call Alert System: All callers hear a pre-recorded message that informs callers that the Galaxy J3 user is riding a two-wheeler and is unable to take the call. The S bike mode user does not get any notification that there was an incoming call (to avoid distraction). In case the call is urgent, the caller may choose to press 1, which allows urgent calls to go through.
• Step 3 – Motion Lock: This feature ensures that if the S bike mode user decides to take the urgent incoming call, he will need to bring his bike to a halt to be able to answer the call. The phone will not allow the incoming call to get answered owing to motion lock. This safety feature is designed to encourage responsible riding.

The S bike mode also sports an intuitive user interface where users can see a log of call notifications while the mode is enabled. It also has a Smart Reply feature where selected contacts will receive an auto-SMS with an estimate of when the user is likely to be available for a call basis a trip destination entered by the user. There is also a dashboard of time and distance travelled using the S bike mode where users stand a chance to win up to INR 1,500 per month from Freecharge for being a responsible rider.

Vivid Display

Samsung Galaxy J3 provides an immersive experience with a large 5 inch HD super AMOLED screen. Whether you are browsing, watching videos or surfing the web at blazing fast 4G speeds; vibrant colours and the larger display brings life to the content and enhances the viewing pleasure. Excellent contrast ratio produces superior imagery with deeper blacks, brighter whites, and more vivid colours, while the large display facilitates better viewing of multimedia content.

Sophisticated Imaging Capabilities

Samsung Galaxy J3 comes with a camera that captures high quality, crisp and detailed photographs with its 8 megapixel rear camera with an f2.2 aperture. It also features a 5 mega-pixel front camera to provide great video calling and selfie experience. The new smart phone is a great shooter that takes detailed photos that look professional, in-focus, and well-lit.

Powerful Performance

Samsung Galaxy J3 is equipped with a 1.5 GHz Quad Core processor and 1.5 GB RAM for easy multi-tasking and fast speed.

Special Operator Offer

Samsung Galaxy J3 users on the Vodafone network get twice the data on select data packs for a period of 6 months in 4G circles and for 2 months in others

Price and Availability

Samsung Galaxy J3 is priced at INR 8,990 and will be available in three colour options of gold, black and white exclusively on Snapdeal from March 31^st 2016.

Samsung J3 Product Specifications

*All functionality, features, specifications and other product information provided in this document including, but not limited to, the benefits, design, pricing, components, performance, availability, and capabilities of the product are subject to change without notice or obligation.