This week, Samsung representatives are standing by at some of the world’s busiest airports, ready to exchange Galaxy Note 7 phones for something new and less combustible. The immediate problem with the Galaxy Note 7 is a manufacturing defect that makes its batteries prone to short-circuiting and combustion. That didn’t need to be a fatal flaw: As recently as 2014, one of the top selling points for Galaxy Note phones was that a user could switch out the battery pack with ease. And that’s precisely what the manufacturers want: An overly expensive battery replacement is really just the starting point for upselling a new phone. The Note 7 recall is a blunt reminder that, in a crisis, those harder-to-repair phones can become a vast liability.

Source: Mint October 20, 2016 04:07 UTC