Home Tech Samsung’s Galaxy Home Missed Its April Launch Date, And The Company Won’t Say Why

Samsung’s Galaxy Home Missed Its April Launch Date, And The Company Won’t Say Why

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Samsung’s Galaxy Home Missed Its April Launch Date, And The Company Won’t Say Why

Today is May 10th. On this day in history, Mother’s Day was observed for the first time over a hundred years ago, the movie Twister premiered in theaters, and Fred Astaire and the Gosselin sextuplets were born (in different years, obviously). What hasn’t happened: Samsung’s explanation for why its smart speaker Galaxy Home has missed its April ship date and what’s causing the delay.

Samsung Galaxy speaker

The Galaxy Home was originally announced in August 2018 when the company also unveiled the Note 9. The speaker was supposed to take on other smart speakers like the Google (Nest?) Home, Amazon Echo, and the Apple HomePod — with the exception that it would run on Samsung’s own voice assistant, Bixby. Samsung said at its most recent February event, where it also announced the now-infamously delayed Galaxy Fold, that the Galaxy Home would be coming in April. That window has obviously passed, and the company has not provided any clarity on why.

When reached for comment, Samsung representatives told The Verge that the company is “planning to launch Galaxy Home in the first half of 2019” and did not give any further details. That leaves Samsung with another month to put the speaker on the market.

Demand for the Samsung speaker is unknown, but the market has proven to be a difficult space when it comes to using proprietary AI. Apple’s Siri-based HomePod hasn’t exactly taken off either; according to estimates last year, Apple shipped (note the difference between shipped and sold) 600,000 HomePods in the quarter when it was released. That figure accounted for just 6 percent of the market share. The HomePod has since received a $50 price cut, which is an atypical move for Apple products that aren’t getting updated on an annual basis.