Industry analysts expected the downward trend to continue even with the positive reception being enjoyed by the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge smartphones.
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The South Korean electronics giant posted profit of 5.75 trillion won ($4.93 billion) on revenue of 48.54 trillion won ($41.7 billion), roughly in line with the South Korean company’s guidance.
Shares of Samsung had fallen 1.6 per cent to 1,243,000 won at 9.18am in Seoul.
Operating profit at the mobile phone unit slumped to 2.76 trillion won from 4.42 trillion won a year earlier.
The results underscore the continuing challenges that Samsung faces in the smartphone market.
Samsung’s latest announcement suggests the company’s next-gen flagship devices could be launched at the “Unpacked” event scheduled to be held on 13 August in New York.
Samsung’s global marketing campaign for its high-end Galaxy S6 series has failed to spark an immediate surge in demand for the smartphone after its sales fell short of expectations. Samsung’s operating income stood at five.nine billion U.S. dollarscontinuing its steady recovery after a surprising earnings shock in the third quarter of past year.
“The Mobile Business plans to firmly maintain sale of premium smartphones by flexibly adjusting the price of the Galaxy S6 and S6 edge, and launching a new model with a larger screen”, the statement said.
It still managed to make money but not nearly as much as the same time a year ago.
The company’s components division was the one growth area in the quarter, with revenues up to KRW 17.87 trillion from KRW 16.23 trillion a year ago. The stock has lost 5.2 percent this year, compared with a 6.6 percent gain in the Kospi index. Samsung said that was largely due to high-value memory chips and increasing demand for its mobile phone processors. Of the handset shipments, smartphones accounted for about 80 percent.
This month, the company scraped through a shareholder vote on the proposed merger of two affiliates, after a US hedge fund led an unprecedented investor revolt against the deal.
Results at Samsung’s other main business units were mixed. This should help grow smartphone shipments from Q3 while tablet sales are expected to remain flat.
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The decline was the fifth straight year-over-year profit drop, as low-cost rivals from China and India continued to weigh on Samsung’s market share and profit margins, particularly for midrange smartphone models.
