LG announce "no more smartphones"

It's official.

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Whether you only just got a new LG smartphone or have been a loyal user for years, listen up.

The company has officially announced that it will no longer be producing phones.

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This week, the tech giant announced that it will be closing its mobile unit as it plans to leave the "highly competitive" smartphone business.

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For years, LG has been pushing the envelope when it comes to phone design.

In 2013, they released the curved screen device, which made them one of the first electronics companies to do so. This was followed by an even more impressive device, the LG G4, as they wowed everyone with its incredible photo-capturing abilities. CNN Business' former tech editor, David Goldman, even said that it "might be the best smartphone camera on the planet." Quite a claim.

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Just last year they released another market first when they launched the LG WING G5 - the phone with two screens! Users were able to rotate one of the screens up to 90 degrees, which made it easier to multitask as they switched between various apps at the same time.

But unfortunately, the company has been having a hard time competing with the industry leaders and the 31st of July will mark the end of an era.

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LG was once one of the top five smartphone producers in the world, but with countries like the United States forming part of the world's third-largest smartphone market, they have been struggling to keep up with the most popular smartphones in the world such as the Samsung Galaxy A51 or any iPhone.

According to Statista.com, the leading smartphone vendors, as of today, are Samsung, Apple, and Huawei. These three tech companies account for half of all smartphone shipments worldwide and together they shipped over 6632.5-million smartphones in 2019!

In 2020, Apple took the top spot and Samsung came in second.

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While LG and Samsung have been longstanding competitors when it comes to many other aspects as well, such as home appliances, there was one thing the latter did way back when that would be its biggest advantage in the long run. Samsung became iPhone's primary competitor in 2012 when the smartphone market was still very young and it decided to jump on the train.

The Samsung G3 was so successful that year that it actually overtook the iPhone 4S in sales, becoming the best-selling smartphone for 2012 and since then the two have been hot on each other's heels.

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While LG has made a lot of great smartphone decisions over the last few years, as mentioned before, they have not been able to compete with the ever-growing market as more and more competitors such as Huawei, Oppo, OnePlus, and other brands with more accessible price points entered the market.

LG still plans on being one of the leading tech companies in other industries and will just be focusing on their original areas of expertise.

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While many are sad to watch them leave, they have had a good run and some things are just not for everyone.

That's just the way the cookie crumbles, or in this case - the phone screen cracks.

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Main image courtesy of iStock