Samsung Mobile Design Head Resigns Amid Galaxy Smartphone Criticism

By Nathan Kirsch

Samsung has replaced the head of its mobile design team amid criticism of the design choices used on the latest Galaxy S smartphone. Chang Dong-hoon offered to resign last week and will be replaced by Lee Min-hyouk, vice president for mobile design, a Samsung spokeswoman said on Thursday according to Reuters. Chang isn’t leaving Samsung, as he will still be overseeing the company’s overall design strategy as head of Samsung’s design center. The Samsung Galaxy S5 smartphone, which debuted globally last month, had modest hardware innovations and some critics were upset that Samsung still used a plastic case design. That ended up with people calling the Galaxy S5 cheap and many journalists have been comparing the dimpled back to a conveyor belt or worse yet a Band-Aid. Samsung didn’t sample Legit Reviews with a Galaxy S5 this time around, so we’ll have to take others word on it.

The Galaxy S Series hasn’t changed much over the past several generations, but it appears that Samsung wants something inspiring and didn’t get that with the Galaxy S5. What will Lee Min-Hyouk bring to the table? Lee, who at 40 is the company’s youngest senior executive and was the man largely responsible for designing the Galaxy S line in its early years. Lee got the nickname “Midas” for his golden touch with the Galaxy series and traveled to Brazil’s Iguazu Falls and the ancient city of Cuzco in Peru for inspiration. It will be interesting to see what Lee does with the Galaxy S6 as at the end of the day the front of smartphones are pretty much entirely a touch display and that only leaves the outer edges and back left to play with for aesthetics.

Samsung Galaxy S Series