Samsung Fast-tracks $5bn Profit

SEOUL – Samsung Electronics says it expects its operating profit for the January-March quarter to be between 5.6 trillion won (around A$4.8 billion) and 6 trillion won, a company record
The result would be nearly double the operating profit of last year’s Q1, reflecting growing sales of its smartphones.Samsung’s mobile phone division is the company’s largest by revenue, though it often produces smaller profits than the company’s semiconductor unit.

That changed last year when higher-grossing smartphones jumped to 30 percent of all the phones Samsung sold – from around 9 percent the year before.

This year, Samsung executives say that smartphones will account for about 50 percent of all their mobile phones.