The mobile phone market is no longer rational. That is why we are seeing such weird things happen like LG exiting. I blame apple.
There are basically three markets nowadays.
1. Ultra luxurious $1000+ phones. These phones are bought purely based on brand name. As a result they generally have a smaller set of features and put the users through some amount of pain. For example, the latest iphone does not have headphone jack, does not come with a charger, does not have expandable memory, does not have a fingerprint sensor, has outdated 5 year old-looking screens with a huge notch, etc. You cannot compete in this category with good, technically sound products. People will pay $1200 for a brick with an apple logo on it, but not for a genuinely advanced phone packed with features, just because it ain't from apple.
2. Mid tier phones. These phones are bought based on a mixture of features and brand value. It is possible to compete here because the customers are making some sort of logical decisions. That is the reason Oneplus is able to gain significant share here. But these also have started falling into the trap of removing features and making users suffer a bit for the brand.
3. Cheap commodity phones. These are extremely cheap, the software is barely acceptable and the hardware is decent. Once again, it is difficult to compete here because these customers will buy the absolute cheapest phone there is with the set of features they want. They will entirely disregard any software polish, any brand association, anything that requires attention to detail. As a result, chinese manufacturers are absolutely killing it in this space.
So the only place for LG to fit here is the 2nd one. This is a downgrade from earlier when they used to be in the flagship game, before apple fucked it up. I guess they are not able or ready to adapt to the new reality of the market. Sony did the same. I respect the decision on some level.
There are basically three markets nowadays.
1. Ultra luxurious $1000+ phones. These phones are bought purely based on brand name. As a result they generally have a smaller set of features and put the users through some amount of pain. For example, the latest iphone does not have headphone jack, does not come with a charger, does not have expandable memory, does not have a fingerprint sensor, has outdated 5 year old-looking screens with a huge notch, etc. You cannot compete in this category with good, technically sound products. People will pay $1200 for a brick with an apple logo on it, but not for a genuinely advanced phone packed with features, just because it ain't from apple.
2. Mid tier phones. These phones are bought based on a mixture of features and brand value. It is possible to compete here because the customers are making some sort of logical decisions. That is the reason Oneplus is able to gain significant share here. But these also have started falling into the trap of removing features and making users suffer a bit for the brand.
3. Cheap commodity phones. These are extremely cheap, the software is barely acceptable and the hardware is decent. Once again, it is difficult to compete here because these customers will buy the absolute cheapest phone there is with the set of features they want. They will entirely disregard any software polish, any brand association, anything that requires attention to detail. As a result, chinese manufacturers are absolutely killing it in this space.
So the only place for LG to fit here is the 2nd one. This is a downgrade from earlier when they used to be in the flagship game, before apple fucked it up. I guess they are not able or ready to adapt to the new reality of the market. Sony did the same. I respect the decision on some level.