PARIS — It’s far from clear what exactly caused Samsung Note 7 to catch fire at this point. Samsung isn’t talking until after it finishes its own investigation.

But a new report emerged Wednesday that the culprit might not be the lithium-ion batteries themselves, which Samsung initially suspected. Rather, the problem might reside in the underlying technology -- tweaks made to the processor in the smartphone.

Attributing an unnamed source who has spoken to Samsung chiefs, the Financial Times reported, “Problems with the phone appeared to have arisen from tweaks to the processor to speed up the rate at which the phone could be charged.”

The source told the U.K. newspaper, “If you try to charge the battery too quickly it can make it more volatile. If you push an engine too hard, it will explode. Something had to give.”

After the market closed Tuesday, the Korean electronics giant announced that it would scrap its Note 7 smartphone and completely halt production.

Samsung's Note 7 comes in two versions, with one using Samsung's own Exynos 8893 processor and another based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 processor.

Giving some credence to the new theory — putting the blame beyond the battery itself — are explosion incidents that have surfaced with replacement phones using new batteries produced by another company.

Samsung initially connected the explosions to batteries produced by Samsung SDI, an affiliate company. The Korea Herald reported that Samsung SDI supplied 70 percent of Note 7 batteries, while Amperex Technology (ATL) supplying the remaining 30 percent.
Initially, Samsung did not observe the overheating issues among Note 7 using ATL batteries. Therefore, after the first recall, as a temporary solution, Samsung asked ATL to step in and supply batteries for the replacement phones.

However, as it turns out, on Monday, the replacement phones with ATL batteries also started blowing up.

ATL is a Hong Kong-based company established in 1999, acquired by TDK in 2005. Its production lines reportedly have been operating under strict manufacturing processes compliant to those of TDK since 2010.

Did this mean that ATL/TDK batteries were also defective?

Not exactly. By process of elimination, Samsung now seems to conclude that changing batteries doesn’t lower the heat.

By all accounts, Samsung’s decision to cancel all production of the Note 7 indicates that the Korean giant realizes it must look elsewhere — other than batteries — to explain the alarming phenomenon of its smartphones bursting into flame.

According to the information posted by the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission, Samsung has received 92 reports of the batteries overheating in the United States, including 26 reports of burns and 55 reports of property damage, including fires in cars and a garage.


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Samsung Needs to Get Transparent

Samsung owes its customers and the tech community a clear explanation of what happened with the lithium ion batteries in its Galaxy Note 7 smartphones.

We live in an industry that operates behind closed walls. Most days corporations need to protect their intellectual property carefully, but this is not one of them.

Lithium ion batteries are widely used across the industry in everything from hearing aids to electric cars. The drive for profits from the premium smartphone market drove Samsung to push the limits of how much work the thinnest and lightest of those batteries could do in a high res, multitasking consumer product.

Something went horribly awry and customers and fellow engineers need to know the details.

Customers deserve an answer because they implicitly trusted the company with products they put in their pockets and held up to their faces. It’s not just Samsung’s credibility at stake here; any maker of smartphones now faces the consumer backlash these phablets created.

Engineers across the supply chain need to understand what happened if they are to prevent it happening again. We are a long way from any other mainstream battery chemistry at a time when the volume of smartphones, cars and other products using lithium ion are rapidly on the rise.

Whatever lessons Samsung learned about these products needs to be shared with the community—with the same intensity and speed with which the products are designed and built.

I applaud executives who made the hard decision to pull the Galaxy Note 7 from the market entirely. The move slashed and estimated $17 billion off Samsung’s market capitalization and could cost another $2.8 billion in quarterly losses, according to analysts quoted by The Wall Street Journal.

You could argue, and plenty will, the company took too long to come to this hard decision. But I think a more important point to argue is that the best reparations should come from transparency.

Samsung can refund the costs of the phone to customers and dealers, and it should. But that won’t stop the problem from happening again.

In a global industry that lacks a global consumer protection agency, Samsung needs to step up to the plate. Investigate and share the flaws of the Galaxy Note 7 batteries with your customers and the technical community. It’s the right thing to do.


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