Samsung to unveil Galaxy S III flagship phone May 3

Samsung Electronics said it will unveil its latest flagship smartphone, widely believed to be the Galaxy S III, at an event in London on May 3.

Samsung Galaxy S III

"Come and meet the next Galaxy" reads Samsung's invitation.

The company sent an invitation to various media outlet about the event, which indicated only that it would be announcing "the next Galaxy." The event will be held at 2 p.m. Eastern Time that day. 

In late January Samsung said it would not announce the Galaxy S III at the Mobile World Congress conference in Barcelona, Spain, and that "the successor to the Galaxy S II smartphone will be unveiled at a separate Samsung-hosted event in the first half of the year, closer to commercial availability of the product."

Little is known about the product, but rumors indicate it may have support for LTE as well as a quad-core Exynos processor. Either way, Samsung will be banking on the device to be a successful follow-up to the Android-powered Galaxy S and Galaxy S II; since the first model was released in August 2010, Samsung has sold over 40 million combined Galaxy smartphone units.

Samsung's rising smartphone sales have propelled the company to the pinnacle of the handset market. Many analysts believe that in the first quarter Samsung surpassed Nokia (NYSE:NOK) to become the world's largest handset maker; Nokia has retained the top handset maker crown for more than a dozen years.

A May launch for the Galaxy S III would also shorten the window in which Nokia has to promote its flagship Lumia 900 Windows Phone smartphone through AT&T Mobility (NYSE:T). The device went on sale for $99.99 April 8 and has sold strongly, if online sales are any indication. However, the device also suffered from a memory management glitch that left some users unable to connect to data networks. Nokia said a software patch to correct the issue was issued late Friday. Lumia 900 customers can also swap their existing Lumia 900 for an updated one. Nokia also said every individual who already purchased a Nokia Lumia 900--or who will purchase one between before April 21--will receive a $100 credit to their AT&T bill from Nokia, essentially making the phone free.

For more:
- see this Reuters article
- see this The Verge article

Related Articles:
Nokia succumbs: Samsung likely to be world's largest handset maker in Q1
Samsung won't unveil Galaxy S III at Mobile World Congress
Samsung loses Q4 smartphone crown to Apple
Samsung backpedals on bada/Tizen OS merger plans
Samsung surpasses 300M handset sales for first time in 2011