Windows 8 no good? Samsung now joins Asian bullies’ gang to trash Microsoft’s OS

By Vicky Kapur
Published Sunday, March 10, 2013
In what is being seen by market observers as the beginning of an all-out Asian gang war against Microsoft, Samsung has now trashed its Windows 8 platform, claiming that its tablet Surface isn’t selling well, and that Windows 8 isn’t a major improvement over Vista, which is widely acknowledged as a disaster.

Jun Dong-soo, the president of Samsung’s memory chip division, made these and a lot more negative comments about Microsoft in a meeting with reporters. His quotes were transcribed by Korea Times.

In a clear stab at Microsoft’s new operating system, Dong-soo says: “I think the Windows 8 system is no better than the previous Windows Vista platform.” Oops.

He added that Microsoft’s “rollout of its Windows Surface tablet is seeing lackluster demand.”

Considering recent market research that shows that global PC shipments are on the decline, Dong-soo decided to lay the blame squarely on Microsoft’s ultra-soft Windows 8. “The global PC industry is steadily shrinking despite the launch of Windows 8,” he said.

Dong-soo even went on to link the poor attach rate for ultrabooks to Microsoft’s “less competitive Windows platform.” Unsurprisingly, this had led the Samsung exec to shift his division’s focus from the fabrication of “conventional” memory chips to the more profitable and booming mobile chip segment.

Incidentally, Samsung is only the latest market player to ‘gang up’ against the Windows 8 platform.

It all began in late November last year, when David Chang, CEO of Asus, the fifth largest PC manufacturer, told the Wall Street Journal that “Demand for Windows 8 is not that good right now.” Around the same time, Nomura analyst Rick Sherlund wrote in a report that “Windows 8 is off to an awkward launch.”

Japanese PC maker Fujitsu’s President Masami Yamamoto was the next to highlight “weak” Windows 8 demand in December. Fujitsu apparently blamed soft Windows 8 demand for missing its own PC shipments target.

The next salvo was fired by another leading PC player, Acer, whose president Jim Wong was quoted in early January this year as saying: “The promotion of the product is really focused on the keyboard, and the users really don’t know how to maximize the touch experience.”

Acer in particular had been pretty vocal about Microsoft and Windows 8. When Microsoft announced the Surface, as early as August 2012, Acer’s chairman and CEO JT Wang has been reported to have made some negative comments about it. “We have said [to Microsoft] think it over. Think twice,” Wang was quoted as saying in comments to the Financial Times.

“It will create a huge negative impact for the ecosystem and other brands may take a negative reaction. It is not something you are good at so please think twice,” he added.

When Windows 8 did come out, Acer’s president of the Americas is supposed to have said: “It’s a slow start, there’s no question.”

And now it’s another leading Asian player, South Korea’s Samsung, that has trashed Windows 8. Okay, who’s next?

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