South Korean tech giant Samsung is likely planning to reduce the prices of the upcoming foldable phones by using ATL batteries.
According to TheElec, Samsung was reviewing using batteries from Chinese battery maker Amperex Technology Limited (ATL) for its upcoming foldable smartphones.
The company is likely considering including ATL as a supplier for its foldable phones to save on costs as analysts expect Samsung to lower the price tags of its latest foldable phones launching later this year.
According to the report, batteries account for around 5 per cent of the cost of manufacturing smartphones.
If Samsung’s MX business, the name of its mobile business, approves of the use, it will be the first time that it is using batteries from ATL for its Galaxy Z series of foldable phones.
ATL once lost the South Korean tech giant as a customer in 2017 following the controversy around the Galaxy Note 7 phones catching fire.
Samsung had blamed faulty batteries as the cause of the debacle at the time.
However, since then, the Chinese battery maker had resumed supplying batteries to the tech giant for the Galaxy A and M series of smartphones. It also started supplying to premium smartphones again with the Galaxy S21 last year.
Samsung had so far mostly used affiliate Samsung SDI for the batteries used in the Galaxy Z Flip and Galaxy Z Fold series.